Published: May 1, 1995

Family Ties

His pre-dawn paper route gives him a little extra cash to add a few personal touches to his school job, such as taking troubled students to lunch. It also affords him the quiet time he needs to compose himself for the trying day ahead. Clemons spends most days helping students in one of the poorest parts of the city survive brushes with violence, drugs, and despair.

"I've buried half a dozen kids in the last two years, most of them shot senselessly in the streets,'' he says. "What we have to provide in our center is hope.''

Going the extra mile to provide that hope has become a hallmark of centers like Clemons' throughout Kentucky. These centers, in fact, have become one of the most prized components of the 1990 Kentucky Education Reform Act. "Legislators tell us we're the part of KERA that you can reach out and touch,'' says Angela Boone-Pillow, coordinator of the family-resource center at...