BY MIKE JAMES

WURTLAND -- Greenup County’s family resource and youth service centers got a chance Tuesday to share their accomplishments with a sympathetic audience — members of the Greenup County Interagency Council, which meets monthly to compare notes on their activities.

The centers, in fact every center across the state, are continuing to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the FR/YSC system, which was one of the cornerstones of the Kentucky Educational Reform Act in 1990.

The centers are best known for assisting with food, clothing and other basic needs of Kentucky’s at-risk schoolchildren, but they also bolster a wide spectrum of school programs, from literacy to after-school clubs.

In fact, Wurtland center coordinator Amy Shaffer pointed out, since KERA was passed and the centers created, Kentucky has jumped from 48th place in the nation based on key education indicators to 27th.

“The numbers speak. We have to be able to prove our worth and I believe we are able to do that,” Shaffer said.

The interagency council illustrates one key to the success of the FR/YSC system — community collaboration, according to regional program manager Doug Jones.

The mission boils down to “what are you all doing for your community,” he said.

In the early days of the system the frequent refrain from communities he visited was that it was the first time anyone from the schools had interacted with them, he said.

A 2016 survey showed overwhelming support — about 95 percent of respondents — for center services and the underlying mission to help students succeed in school, Jones said.

And the system still has work to do, according to a 2016 report.

Top issues now include:

* lack of resources such as food, clothes, housing and school supplies for children and their families.

* children being raised by grandparents or other relatives.

* parents with drug problems.

* neglect and abuse, including lack of food, poor hygiene, lack of medical care and lack of educational involvement.

* lack of parenting skills, parent involvement and parent accountability for their children.