“I’m looking for my leaders,” he says. “Show me your hands if you are a leader. Raise them high!” Nearly every child is waving. “Everybody look around,” Wilson says. “These are my young people that will help you if need help.” He didn’t ask, but every one of the blue-shirt LINC staffers has made the same promise — to the children, their families and the community.

Fired up and ready to go. “It’s that time of year,” said LINC Caring Communities Director Sean Akridge. “ . . . anticipation, excitement, joy . . . reconnecting boys and girls with their friends, reconnecting parents with their friends . . .” See what LINC has in store for the coming school year.

When it comes to understanding the paths through and out of poverty, the LINC teams in the training room were ready for an advanced course. So when LINC gathered its staff with specialists from the Missouri Department of Social Services to train on “Bridges out of Poverty,” the work got serious fast.

We’ve got witnesses. Children and LINC staff who were there tell the tale of explosions, bubbling concoctions and seeming magic that was the first year of LINC’s in-house S.T.E.A.M. team.

“LINC approaches summer with a go-get-’em attitude.” So goes the energy across before and after school programs with all of LINC’s school district partners and special Freedom Schools as hundreds of children saw their summer education spiced with exciting field trips and celebrations.