At the Mustard Seed Catholic Worker summer program, children receive academic help and serve others

By Tanya Connor | The Catholic Free Press

WORCESTER – A Mustard Seed Catholic Worker summer program enabled children living nearby to help with the food pantry and free meals there, connect with their neighborhood, and experience the wider world.

The program also helps the Mustard Seed, which works in various ways with people in need, to broaden its outreach in the Piedmont neighborhood.

The free Monday-Friday summer program for 23 mostly low-income children ages 5-11 was held throughout July, said Raymond Kane, director. The program involved academic help and creative projects at the Mustard Seed’s house at 93 Piedmont St., and field trips in the city and beyond.

The Mustard Seed grant writer solicited money to cover costs, said Mr. Kane, who is on the Mustard Seed’s board and helps run its food pantry.

Cornerstone Bank gave a grant and taught the children about budgeting and purchasing, said Sarah Beachman, community relations assistant for the bank, who went to the Mustard Seed to give the lessons with others.

Free breakfasts and lunches for the children were delivered by the Friendly House neighborhood center which provides meals to area programs, Mr. Kane said.

Frank Kartheiser, who helped to found the Mustard Seed in the 1970s, said he brought the summer program there a few years ago, with help from Holy Cross students who started it at the Ascension church hall. The model is the same, with additions Mr. Kane instituted this year.

Sylvester “Sly” Dwyer, of St. John Parish, told how the program began.

“Me and my friends were volunteering at the Ascension after-school program” when that former parish’s campus was part of St. John’s, he said. They volunteered through Student Programs for Urban Development (SPUD) at the College of the Holy Cross.

After-school program participants expected to be staying home for the summer, Mr. Dwyer said, noting that summer programs might have cost their low-income families too much.
He and fellow students Joseph Ertle and Kathryn O’Sullivan created a curriculum for these children, as a Holy Cross summer research project, “so the kids could have a fun, safe and educational summer” at Ascension. Recruiting fellow students to help, the Holy Cross three-some ran the program in 2019 and again in 2021 after pandemic restrictions were lifted.

“It was awesome!” Mr. Dwyer said. “We had kids telling us they loved it!” Pre-tests and post-tests showed the children’s academic growth.

Mr. Kartheiser, a Blessed Sacrament parishioner, said he observed the program and recruited Mustard Seed neighborhood children for it; he’d considered having such a program there.

In 2022, he got the founders, who had graduated from Holy Cross, to move the program to the Mustard Seed and help organize it there before leaving other Holy Cross students to run it.

Mr. Kartheiser, 74, said he ran the 2023 program when the scheduled director couldn’t, and “those kids wore me out” with their youthful energy. This year, he got a new director – Mr. Kane, who belongs to St. Patrick Parish in Whitinsville and teaches French, Spanish and Latin at Putnam High School in Putnam, Connecticut.

Program participants’ academic needs were identified, and math, science and reading were part of the program, Mr. Kane said. They chose books for themselves at TidePool Bookshop on Chandler Street.

In addition to providing academic help, how is the summer program connected with the Catholic Worker?

“Being a Catholic Worker is serving the community,” replied Mr. Kane.

He connected the children with other Mustard Seed programs by having them make fruit salad for the free evening meal, decorate the dining room with their artwork, and make food pantry baskets, he said. (He said they couldn’t actually interact with those served because adults working with children need background checks.)

During a scavenger hunt, the children had their photos taken in front of their homes and at other sites.

“What I wanted them to do was introduce their neighborhood to their counselors ... because I wanted them to be proud of where they live, because I think the neighborhood sometimes gets a bad rap,” as a place of poverty and crime, Mr. Kane explained. He said the children were proud to show where they lived.

Mr. Kartheiser expressed a desire to increase the Mustard Seed’s connections with neighbors.

“We were in our building all the time,” preparing free meals, he said. “This [summer program] is a way to be real neighbors. ... To deal with the children, you’ve got to get to know the parents.”

He said the summer program is not specifically Catholic but could be an evangelization opportunity “if we could build the relationships” first. Upon learning parents’ needs, the Mustard Seed could respond. Upon learning what the Mustard Seed offers, families can volunteer or seek help there, as some have done. But the population shifts as people move away, he said.    

Some children return to the program annually; they are accepted first, then others are recruited from local schools, Mr. Kartheiser said.

This year’s number of participants (23) and at least 95 percent attendance rate were higher than ever, Mr. Kane said.

“I give Ray credit for that,” Mr. Kartheiser said. “He’s running a really good program.”

Mr. Kane said returning participants over age 11 are “counselors-in-training.” There were also five counselors – high school and college students and a recent graduate. Three volunteer at the food pantry too.

“I think ... when you work with kids, you get a different perspective on life,” said Ksenija Scahill, one of those counselors. “It’s very hopeful and encouraging.” Some of this year’s program participants have experienced more hardships than many adults, but have a positive outlook nevertheless.

She said she worked with Mr. Kane this year at the Mustard Seed’s meals and food pantry in an internship for her now-completed Clark University master’s degree in community development.

“Ray has been a mentor to me, and he’s inspired me to do this work” of being engaged in the community in the future, she said. “I definitely want to do my part. I feel like I am doing that when I’m working with the Catholic Worker. I feel like I’m not only doing my part in the community, but I’m also doing my part personally, because my father and my grandfather were both involved in the Catholic Worker in New York.”