Dear William Rainey Harper Families,

Welcome to a new school year! My name is Kenzie Hanlon, and I am very excited to introduce myself as the Say Yes Cleveland Family Support Specialist at William Rainey Harper! As a licensed independent social worker in the field for 8 years as both a community-based case manager and a school-based therapist, I am thrilled to be a part of this wonderful team of educators, scholars, and families.

Say Yes Cleveland is a new local organization that provides two big things for CMSD students: support services while in CMSD schools, and tuition scholarships after high school. Say Yes Cleveland began providing support services in 2019 with 16 CMSD schools and has expanded this year to a total of 69 CMSD and partner charter schools. By the year 2023, the goal is for every CMSD school to have a family support specialist.

For current CMSD students, Say Yes Cleveland will provide important support services to help students overcome barriers and stay on-track to success. As our school’s Family Support Specialist, my role will be to help connect students and families to services like free legal assistance, food access, technology access, afterschool, summer programing and much more.

Once students graduate from a CMSD high school, Say Yes Cleveland provides scholarships covering the cost of college or postsecondary tuition, after federal and state grants, to every eligible CMSD graduate for the next 25 years. To be eligible for a scholarship, a student must continuously reside within CMSD boundaries and be continuously enrolled in a CMSD high school from 9^th grade through graduation.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me by phone or email at any time. I look forward to serving the William Rainey Harper community, educators, scholars, and families.

Best wishes for the new school year!

Kenzie Hanlon

MSSA, LISW

khanlon@sayyescleveland.org

216-538-0883

Family Support Specialist