Statements

Mission

Harvest Hands is a catalyst for community development working for wholeness in South Nashville. We work alongside our neighbors to further education, healthy living, spiritual formation, and economic development.

Background

We believe neighborhood revitalization begins with investing in the lives of kids. We're working to raise up a generation of leaders from our neighborhood to transform South Nashville. When our operations started in 2007, we spent a lot of time getting to know our neighbors and asking what the community needed. The consistent answer was that kids needed constructive activities after school. In the unsupervised hours between school and parents returning home from work (3 - 6 PM), violent juvenile crime triples and kids face becoming victims of crime. In response, we gathered up resources and started an after school and summer program for students in pre-kindergarten through high school.

In 2016, we participated in a Nashville summit on youth violence where six priority areas were identified to reduce youth violence: training and employment, meaningful youth engagement, health awareness and access, restorative justice and diversion, a safe environment, and education. In response, we expanded our programming to address each of these priority areas in order to meet our mission of cultivating holistic community development in our neighborhood. Today, students enrolled in our after school programs participate in age-appropriate lessons and activities related to language arts and literacy, math skill development, socio-emotional learning, leadership development, and spiritual formation. High school students are invited to work at our social enterprise, Humphreys Street, where they receive critical job skills training, financial literacy resources, and career discernment counseling.

In 2023, we started an in-house counseling program for our students and their families. The adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) of our students were amplified by the effects of the pandemic, and many mental health resources are inaccessible to our community due to cost and transportation. Our students are now able to address feelings of insecurity, isolation, and anxiety caused by ACEs. The demand for counseling continues to grow with our students, especially with the opening of our second site, Harvest Hands at Harding Place, at the start of the 2023-2024 school year.

Along with our counseling program and new program center, Humphreys Street was also invited to open a kiosk inside Bridgestone Arena and started serving coffee at events in December. Through our investment in the Bridgestone kiosk, we can employ 4 additional young leaders.

Impact

Since 2008, more than 90% of student employees have completed high school. In the last 2 years, 100% of our students have received a full-time job/internship or enrolled in a college/job training program within 12 months of graduating. Many of our program graduates have returned to serve their community, some even by joining the full-time staff at Harvest Hands. Today, about one-sixth of full-time staff members at Harvest Hands are past program participants or parents of participants. Harvest Hands is raising leaders and providing meaningful employment that enables our neighbors to hone their talents and gifts. Long term, we aim to kindle generational transformation and foster flourishing neighborhoods in South Nashville.

In the 2024-2025 school year, Harvest Hands plans to host 120 students across three after school program sites, employ 30 students through our social enterprise, Humphreys Street, and register 150 students through our affordable sports program, Empower Sports, totaling 300 students.

Needs

At this time, Harvest Hands is accepting monetary funds, as well as in-kind contributions, to support academic and wellness programs for elementary, middle & high school students, and to support the job skills training and mentoring program through our student-led social enterprise Humphreys Street. Additionally, we can receive support through our business at Humphreys Street. To shop Humphreys Street products, please visit humphreysstreet.com or come see us in one of our two locations. To inquire about wholesale accounts with Humphreys Street, please email Casey at casey@harvesthandscdc.com.

Greater Nashville is home to many neighbors in under-resourced communities, like Napier-Sudekum, with youth who have the potential to become the next generation of community leaders. As we look to broaden the community we serve, we aim to expand our resources to best address our neighborhood's needs and grow our reach to support other communities in Nashville. Harvest Hands is excited to expand our mission and services by identifying a third site for our programs. We need to raise an additional $48,640 this year to fund this project through its first semester of operations, serving 25 additional students.

Service Categories
Primary Category:	Youth Development  - Youth Development Programs
Secondary Category:	Community Improvement, Capacity Building  - Community & Neighborhood Development
Tertiary Category:	Employment  - Job Training

Areas Served

Harvest Hands serves South Nashville, an area that has experienced high rates of poverty, joblessness, and violence. The zip codes where of our two community centers, 37210 and 37211, have average annual incomes well below that of the city as a whole, and about attend is 86% economically disadvantaged. The neighborhoods that Harvest Hands serves do not have local access to a grocery store.

TN - Davidson