What We do

Homework Help and Tutoring
Jubilee students are given homework assistance every week day of the academic year from 3:15 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. and it is the program our kids love the most! This assistance is provided by Jubilee Senior Counselors, Alumni Jubilee Students, and our core group of dedicated volunteers. The Center also provides the Boost Tutoring Program Monday through Thursday nights from 6:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m., giving our students extra academic help in subjects with which they are experiencing difficulties. This program is fully staffed by community volunteers. To find out more about volunteering at The Jubilee Center see the Volunteer Page.

Enrichment
Children build communication, collaboration, and conflict resolution skills through the arts while deepening their self awareness and sense of personal worth. That is why The Jubilee Center currently offers dance, yoga, poetry, creative writing, cooking and visual arts from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., Monday through Thursday. Through a grant from the Hudson County Cultural Affairs Division our children have learned jazz, tap, modern, Hip-Hop and ballet. The Center also provides computer workshops, and the children are working on personal newsletters to also serve these same objectives.

Evening Meals
One of the obstacles these children face is the rampant asthma, obesity and high blood pressure that can result from the high caloric, un-nutritious, quick and inexpensive foods that are most readily available to them. 96% of the children enrolled at the public school nearest to Hoboken’s public housing participate in the free breakfast and lunch program the state provides for low income children. For a number of these children, the evening meal provided at The Center is the only meal they would have at the end of the day. program provides a USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) approved meal two evenings a We benefit greatly by the generosity of five local restaurants — Black Bear Bar & Grill, The Madison Bar & Grill, Zack’s Oak Bar & Restaurant, Zylo Tuscan Steak House, and 10th & Willow Bar & Grill — who each provide a meal for all our children once a week.

In addition Margherita’s Pizzeria & Cafe – who also provide pizza once a month.

Field Trips and Community Events
Children at The Jubilee Center go on a wide array of educational and recreational field trips over the course of a year, ranging from The Liberty Science Center, to NJPAC in Newark, to Yankees Stadium, and more. Community Events over the last year have included the Martin Luther Day of Celebration and the Daddy and Me “Valentines Day” Dance.

As a sponsor of the Hoboken Housing Authority’s Health Fair, The Jubilee Center in partnership with AMERIGROUP held a Health and Nutrition Class for parents which was followed by a workshop lead by Urban Kitchen, offering advice on preparing inexpensive and nutritious meals for children.

The Hoboken Family Alliance continues to hold monthly birthday parties for The Center’s children, insuring that no child is left uncelebrated. Birthday party coordinator Colleen Castle submitted information about these parties to Family Fun Magazine which featured a story about them and made a $5,000 grant to The Center.

Summer Program
The Jubilee Center’s seven week long summer program runs from 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. offering academic supplementation to help students be one step ahead for the up-coming academic year and an expanded arts and extra curricular format. The Jubilee Center alumni are employed in the summer program as student counselors, providing them with job experience and our children with peer role models. Over the course of the summer, the children raise funds by holding car washes and selling water and coffee at local commuter stops to take a week long camping trip at Camp Linwood-MacDonald. For many of these children, this is their first experience of walking in the woods, catching a frog, or paddling a canoe.

Plans for the Future
The Jubilee Center is engaged in a program assessment and has created criteria to chart objectives and measurable outcomes by which our programs may demonstrate the impact they have upon the children we serve.
We have started a Teens Program led by Vanessa Falco. We are applying for grants from the State of New Jersey to augment our afterschool and tutoring programs, help children with mandated tests.