Mother-daughter team supports city families.
By: Gwen McNamara
WEST WINDSOR Mothers and daughters are always looking for ways to get closer.
Some go shopping together, others take trips but one township mother-daughter team has taken it a step further.
Cheryl Gaither Ojeda and her 17-year-old daughter, Illeana, a senior at Stuart Country Day School of the Sacred Heart, created a nonprofit organization called SEEDS to offer educational support to children and their families in Trenton.
The pair will be introducing the program to the Trenton community from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday at the West Ward Community Center in Trenton.
"The program is based on a concept I learned while growing up," Ms. Gaither Ojeda said, "that learning is a two-part process. It involves both the child and the parents.
"We plan on teaching kids learning tools, mentoring them and also mentoring their families," she continued. "Planting the seeds of success in their minds."
SEEDS is targeted toward children 6 to 13, Ms. Gaither Ojeda said.
On Saturday, she and her daughter will be soliciting volunteers, handing out between 500 and 600 free books and distributing homemade T-shirts. Family and friends also will be helping with free food, crafts, storytelling and poetry reading.
To get things started, Ms. Gaither Ojeda and her daughter have received some monetary help as well from Bread for the Journey, an international organization that encourages neighborhood philanthropy. The Princeton chapter of the organization awarded SEEDS a $600 grant.
Ms. Gaither Ojeda and her daughter decided to start up the nonprofit after hearing about educational conditions in Trenton.
"We always as a family have done public outreach," Ms. Gaither Ojeda said. "After moving here from Illinois three years ago, I heard a lot about Trenton and how educational needs were not being met and how kids are not succeeding as best they should. I knew then that’s what we were going to focus on."
"Education is key. That’s the value my mom’s instilled in us," Illeana added. "In Illinois, we did smaller projects, like starting a backpack drive for inner-city kids, but now we want to take that further. We decided to make a difference in someone’s life by using education as the tool."
Ms. Gaither Ojeda, an attorney, and her husband, Manuel, also an attorney, live in the southern portion of the township with their three children Illeana, Jillian, 9, who also attends Stuart, and Andrew, 13, who goes to the Thomas R. Grover Middle School in West Windsor.
"My mother was a social worker and really got involved with her community," Ms. Gaither Ojeda said. "I’ve been blessed and want to give back and want my kids to learn that, too.
"With SEEDS," she continued, "not only am I teaching my children, but my daughter and I are helping others too."
For more information about SEEDS, contact Ms. Gaither Ojeda at (917) 846-4238.