During the long months that passed between a Covid-canceled talent show and Faxon Elementary’s Lights On Afterschool dance party, three siblings in LINC’s Caring Communities program lost their mother to gun violence.

One of those children, a boy only 8 years old, had wanted to sing in 2020.

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He kept asking when LINC was going to get the talent show back, said LINC’s Faxon Caring Communities Coordinator Yolanda Robinson.

But now, after such pain, could he sing again?

At Faxon — and at all of LINC’s sites — the annual Lights On Afterschool celebrations of the power of community schools stepped into their resilient communities with grace and hard-won joy.

LINC’s teams had worked in their communities through the pandemic, holding together the battered bridges that kept families connected to comforts and services. As schools returned in full, their Caring Communities after-school programs opened their doors as well.

From North Kansas City to Grandview there were trunk-or-treats, carnivals, food festivals, games, dancing — all of this reflecting what Robinson wanted so badly for her Faxon community: “Let’s make new moments. Let’s make new memories.”

The little boy was nervous when Robinson urged him to the front of the gym. The raucous games and dancing that accompanied a hip-hop sound system hushed. Children sat on the gym floor. Adults looked on. The child took up the microphone with his older brother at his side, his younger sister nearby. His favorite song was queued up.

And he sang.

“Looking at this trauma” that so many people endured, Robinson said, “this was symbolic to me. I said, ‘Give me a song,’ and finally he had the nerve to do it. He did it.”

A year ago, with the pandemic in force and vaccines still months away, many LINC sites could not have Lights On events, and those that could put on outdoor, drive-through events.

This year, it was good to be back, said Sean Akridge, Caring Communities Administrator.

“After experiencing a major shift or in some cases an absence to the annual celebration, sites were excited to participate on a broader, though still somewhat modified scale,” he said. “Students enjoyed the day's special activities conducted by LINC staff and its partners.”

Those partners included KC Community Gardens, Kansas City Young Audiences, Mad Science, NickiFit and Fitness4Ever.

“Several sites passed out free books to students as well,” Akridge said.

Fun with Mad Science, a green dinosaur costume, cotton candy making and hot dogs drew students and parents to the playground at Dobbs Elementary in Hickman Mills — another of the many Lights On events — with widespread joy, said LINC’s Dobbs Caring Communities Coordinator Joyce Kynard.

“The verbal responses, laughter and smiles were evidence,” she said. “Individually and collectively, we are looking forward to next year's Lights On event.”

According to the Afterschool Alliance, which initiated Lights On Afterschool, the number of events nationwide has grown from 1,200 in the beginning in 2000 to more than 8,000 events today.

The annual rallies attract more than 1 million Americans in the celebration to call attention to the importance of after-school programs for America's children, families and communities.

LINC has been there from the beginning.

This year the events were held at sites that included LINC programs in the Kansas City, Hickman Mills, Grandview, Center and North Kansas City school districts and Lee A. Tolbert Community Academy charter school.

Videos and a photo gallery from many of LINC’s events this year can be seen here, and another set of videos and photos can be seen here.

By Joe Robertson/LINC Writer

Video edited by Bryan Shepard