Gladys Allen Brigham Community Center

Our Mission
We are a multi-service organization empowering children and youth, with a special emphasis on girls, to become responsible, confident and personally fulfilled individuals.

Our History
For over a century, Gladys Allen Brigham Community Center has provided guidance, support, and advocacy for girls and their families. As one of Berkshire County’s largest social service organizations, the Brigham Center has touched countless lives through its wide range of programs and services.

During 2008, Berkshire United Way implemented an enhanced method for assessing community needs, tracking progress and communicating results. BUW sought broad based community input to develop an aspiration for the county and identify community needs and priorities to be considered for BUW investments. The aspiration, “Making Berkshire County a community of hope and opportunity, where every individual and family can live, work and thrive” is both inspirational and achievable. With strong community guidance as well as leveraging resources with the quality work completed by the Berkshire Compact for Higher Education and the Berkshire Blueprint, BUW believes that the best way to support this aspiration is to invest in the following priorities and outcomes:

 Helping Children and Families Succeed:  All children will arrive at kindergarten ready to learn and all young adults will successfully transition to work, higher education or training.

Promoting Financial Stability and Independence: All individuals are empowered to define and achieve their goals for financial independence and career success.

Meeting Basic Needs: Individuals move from a crisis situation, where their basic needs are met by the “safety net” of service providers, to independently meeting their own needs and, individuals demonstrate an increased ability to manage family resources to meet basic needs (food, shelter, and healthcare) and/or plan to address other financial priorities.

While the Brigham Community Center in some way touches upon all priorities our primary focus is on Helping Children and Families succeed. We respond to challenges with solutions – strengthening programs and services for changing local needs – and by actively seeking to serve a wider population through outreach programs and partnerships.

We use positive Youth Development practices to provide supports to young people as they build their capacities and strengths to meet personal and social needs. We provide services and opportunities to support children and youth to develop a sense of a competency, worth, connectiveness and empowerment. This approach is not a way to “fix troubled kids.” Rather, it is about people, programs, institutions and systems that provide all youth, “troubled” or not, with the supports and opportunities they need to empower themselves. The Brigham Community Center has skilled program staff that can provide such services to its children, youth and families.

Early Childhood Education
Infant to pre-kindergarten

• Focus on kindergarten readiness;
• On-site pool for swim lessons and gymnasium for physical fitness with children 2 and up;
• Outdoor classroom to engage children in STEM programming at an early age;
• Early literacy programming;
• Accredited by NAEYC, the National Association for the Education of Youth Children and licensed by the Massachusetts Department of Early Education & Care.

ABC School Age Enrichment
Kindergarten to age 14

• Focus on literacy, education support and life skills programming;
• Collaboration with local organizations like Berkshire Community College, Elms College and WAM Theatre to further augment our programming;
• Outdoor classroom for students through 3rd grade to engage children in STEM programming at an early age;
• Summer learning loss curriculum offered in July and August;

• Accredited by NAEYC, the National Association for the Education of Youth Children and licensed by the Massachusetts Department of Early Education & Care.

Girls Inc. of the Berkshires
Girls ages 5-18

• Only Girls Inc. Affiliate in Berkshire County offering nationally recognized programming for girls;
• Provides outreach programs in schools throughout Berkshire County;
• Specializes in healthy sexuality, economic literacy, violence prevention and STEM programs.

Youth Empowerment Services -YES
Adolescent boys and girls

• Prevention and intervention based-services with a focus on character, values and leadership development, literacy education, career exploration and crisis intervention;
• Offers multi-method family centered case management and support and family strengthening programs like Active Parenting.

Aquatics
All ages

• Swim instruction for all levels including Tiny Tots, children’s lessons, adult programs;
• Adult water fitness programs;
• Swim Club and Swim Team;
• Annual Invitational Swim Meet;
• Collaboration with United Cerebral Palsy and Berkshire County Arc to offer weekly swim programming for the disabled.

Camp Stevenson Witawentin
Girls ages 5-18

• Summer day camp for girls on beautiful Onota Lake, traditional camp programs along with prevention education.
• Traditional camp programs along with prevention education, literacy and STEM to prevent summer learning loss.
• Weekly special events.