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. DAVID T. F0STER lll - dtfoster@charlotteobservercarm

Iirtor Courtney Enos helps Cierra_Clawson,lo, with her homework at the Gharlotte \

Empowerment Zone at the Frcssley Ridge Apartments.

EMPOWERMENT their home and their commu- as Urban Restoration, are of-

ffi from 18

bold initiative our eity needs."NeXus has crafted s.ix pro-

grams for Pressley Ridge, in-cluding day care/preschool ed-ucation, sulnmer school andeven parent training.

Noah Manyika is the found-er of NeXus, and his dream isfor the success in PressleyRidge to prompt nonprofits tocreate zones in all of Char-lotte's troubled areas.

"Money will always be inshort supply for the schools, sowe need to ask ourselves as asociety: Are we going to justgive up, or are we going to starttryrngto do things differently?"he says. "How about instead ofasking the child to come to usfor help, we focus resources on

nity, to make sure it is support-ive of goals in the schools?"

The k*y to making the zones'work, he says, is forging part-nerships between charities,businesses, the faith communi-ty and government agencies. ,

Among the first of those'col-laborations was an arrange-ment with Pressley Hdgewhose 1,500 tenants include 31

homeless families transferredlast year from the Hall Housetemporary shelter"

Pressley Ridge has givenNeXus the use of lwo adjoiningapartments for meetings.Property manager AmberThompson says a third willsoon be added to handle grow-ing attendance.-*fhat

tells me this is worhing," she says, "ft's woirderfiJl."

Other local nonprofits, such

fering aid through program-rning for parents.

NeXus also has reached outto the public schools throughSugar Creek Charter School, tobecome thenextlinkin the eln-powerment zone chain;

Frank Martin is both a foun-ding board member of theschool and a supporter of theempowerment zone effort. Hesays Sugar CreelCs involve-ment is stillbeing explored, butone idea is to create a "fun"summer school program to beoffered both at the school andat Pressley Ridge. He'd like tosee it start in 2011.

n'I would hope that theschool would be a catalyst forother schools," he says, "justlike Pressley Ridge will be acatalyst for other neighbor-hoods""