Weekly Media Roundup: May 20, 2026

South Carolina Afterschool Alliance Launches “Healthy Futures Afterschool” Initiative to Support Youth Well-Being and Prevention, Midlands Biz (South Carolina)

With funding from the Richland County Opioid Recovery Fund, the South Carolina Afterschool Alliance (SCAA) is launching the Healthy Futures Afterschool initiative to support afterschool programs with tools and resources to promote youth well-being and prevent substance misuse. The Boys & Girls Club of the Crescent Region will incorporate Healthy Futures Afterschool starting this summer, training college student to deliver evidence-based prevention programming, strengthening mentoring and peer support relationships, equipping staff with Mental Health First Aid tools, offering resources to families and more. “At its core, this work is about connection,” SCAA President and CEO Zelda Waymer told Midlands BIz. “When young people have trusted adults they can talk to, it changes outcomes. This initiative is about strengthening those connections before young people reach a crisis point.”

Lehigh County DA’s Office Donates $100K In Drug Forfeiture Funds to Boys & Girls Club of Allentown, WFMZ (Pennsylvania)

Thanks to a $100,000 donation from the Lehigh County District Attorney’s Office, the Cumberland Garden’s Boys & Girls Club of Allentown, Pennsylvania will keep its doors open this summer despite cuts in federal funding. The donation comes from the district’s drug forfeiture funds (money seized from convicted drug dealers) and supports the site’s afterschool and summer programs. “We see programs like this as a long-term project in reducing crime and delinquency in our community,” District Attorney Gavin Holihan told WFMZ. “It allows good kids to stay good kids. It allows them to become good teenagers; it allows them to become good adults.” The Club’s goal is to reach $500,000 to help sustain the program for the next three to five years.

Free After-School Program Empowers Segundo Barrio Youth Through Music, KTSM (Texas)

Through the Tocando Community Music Project, elementary and middle school students in El Paso, Texas learn to play musical instruments while building confidence, academic skills and teamwork. Over the past 13 years, the free afterschool program has grown from a small group at Hart Elementary into a citywide initiative offering daily orchestra, choir, piano and rhythm instruction, as well as nutritious snacks, field trips and performance opportunities. “I really feel like this helps students learn resilience by teaching themselves and showing themselves every single day that every day that they show up and try, they can do something more difficult that they did the previous day,” Program Director Natalie Conover told KTSM. “This experience for our students, and especially in a musical ensemble, is so unique because we only win when we make it at the end as a group.”

Rocksolid Not Your Typical After-School Program for Teens, The Columbian (Washington)

At the Rocksolid Teen Center afterschool program in Brush Prairie, Washington, middle and high schoolers take part in creative, engaging activities ranging from making homemade pizza to playing Hula-Hoop pickleball. Program leaders say Rocksolid fills an important niche for teens in the community, especially as funding shortfalls force the local school district to cut back on extracurriculars. “In Vancouver, their populations are well served in that area. But out here, it’s sort of a desert for what kids between the ages of 12 and 18 can do after school,” Executive Director Grant Gilson told the Columbian. “A lot of the school districts are facing hardships. Hopefully, we can help out too and can offer some of these teens that space to explore different passions.”