At Casa, we firmly believe in the whole-child philosophy. We apply a collective impact approach that encompasses education as well as character development to create a more meaningful, intentional, and effective way to make sure our students will be able to successfully navigate life’s challenges during—and beyond—their education.
“Ensuring each child, in each school, in each community is healthy, safe, engaged, supported, and challenged.”
Our education methods are holistic, meaning we offer academic tutoring and personalized mentorship to college and career counseling—along a student’s entire learning path.
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A unique aspect of Casa is the steady support we provide to our students—from kindergarten to college. The Kinder to College Study Companions Program is Casa's cornerstone program, pairing each student with a trained mentor. Our successful program accompanies students through every stage and milestone of their education, measuring their growth along the way, throughout their entire academic journey and beyond.
Many of our Casa students begin their journey in elementary school and continue through enrollment in college. During the weekly sessions at Casa, we help students accomplish homework assignments in a timely and complete manner, improve their reading and math skills, and develop executive functioning skills, equating to an average of 75 mentoring hours per student, per year.
Parent participation is a key indicator for academic success. Casa provides services to help the parents enhance their parenting skills using positive parenting techniques. Parents also participate in workshops addressing health and wellbeing, mental health, and education.
Keeping our students learning, growing, and engaged over the summer.
Casa offers a fun, educational environment for students in grades K-6 to foster continued learning during summer break. The extracurricular program is supplemented by the research projects of our S Initiative and includes educational field trips such as a visit to the World Famous San Diego Zoo, and many other fun activities.
This initiative ensures builds reading skills in kindergarten and early elementary grades, an important milestone for school success. Our initiative includes a structured academic environment and curriculum for 4 and 5-year-old children. Taught once a week, in a small-group classroom setting, experienced early childhood educators will set out to get your kids ready for school, using benchmarks to measure their progress and readiness level.
To increase student access to careers in Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math, the STEAM initiative aims to provide all K-12 children with STEAM-focused enrichment activities outside school hours. With the help of community partners, Casa provides opportunities for students to compete as a team in FIRST LEGO League robotics competitions, participate in a weekly engineering club, and more!
Designed to assist students in discovering how they can combine both their personal passions with their professional goals.
For middle and high school students, Casa facilitates College & Career Pathways Workshops using career assessment tools and curriculum, career exploration field trips to local universities and businesses, and application support for college, vocational school, and financial assistance. The workshops help students explore and map out their pathways to future careers, creating San Diego's next generation of leaders.
Casa de Amistad awards college scholarships to eligible graduating seniors. To be eligible, students must participate in our College and Career Pathways program starting their Junior year of high school and have a minimum overall 2.5 GPA. Students may choose to use their scholarship for vocational training, community college, and four-year universities.
These pillars combined help create a tight-knit, family culture and uplifting, nurturing, and positive learning environment that supplies long-term benefits that result in a remarkably positive influence on a child’s life aspirations, career trajectory, and achievement.
Tutoring and mentoring have shown to have a significant impact on the academic and emotional health of the students. Due to our one-on-one and small group engagement, many of our tutors and mentors form strong bonds with our students.
Many of them have been with Casa for multiple years, and often personal relationships between the tutor/mentor and the students last far beyond high school. These lasting developmental relationships not only effectively provide support, but they instill care, power, and trust as powerful motivators in their lives.
Limited or missing access to enrichment activities is a contributing factor for the educational achievement gap. Kids from low-income households, challenged by a language barrier, or parents limited education, need access to enrichment activities to catch up in school. Casa approaches our students' transition to higher education from three angles: knowledge, services, and insights.
No one can do it alone. Teamwork and collective action are the most powerful tools in achieving and exceeding our goals. And it’s made possible by our volunteers, staff, parents, and partners working together to uplift our neighborhoods.
