About Upstate Circle of Friends

Upstate Circle of Friends began in May 2006. Deloris Barksdale, President/CEO, had a need and fulfilled it. Finding after-school and summer time care for Aaron (her 16 year old special needs son) was difficult. Having previous experience starting and running a summer day camp and an after-schoolprogram for 5 years, Deloris with the strong encouragement of her husband Bernard, began Upstate Circle of Friends summer day program. During the first summer, five parents enrolled their children.To Deloris, this was a success because there was no money for advertising.

The summer of 2007, Upstate Circle of Friends served 15 students in their special needs summer day camp. UCF also expanded and offered a summer day camp to 50 youth in the surrounding community from Fleetwood Manor, Highlands, and Crescent Landing. Through partnerships, Operation GO!provided a bus, Greenville County Schools provided lunches through the Summer Seamless Lunch Program, and Operation GO! SWAT (Sidewalk Action Team) provided free concert with outside activities for the youth for 10 weeks.

In the Spring of 2008, we partnered with the Department of Juvenile Justice and offered
a free Teen Afterschool Center for 16 students from Carolina High and Southside High. We offered academicassistance, teen pregnancy prevention sessions, hot meals, and anger management sessions to provide a variety of programs to help the youth cope with the many different situations they face.

This past summer of 2008, we served 130 youth, 20 of whom were special needs, and 110 were youth in the surrounding communities of Highlands, Crescent Landing, Cypress Cove, Sunbelt, and Belle Meade. community. Through partnerships with Greenville County Police (Crime Prevention Unit Master Deputy Nathalie Hill), Greenville Family Partnership, and Greenville County Schools (Summer Seamless Lunch Program), we were able to provide lunches, sessions on anger management, sessions on bullying, pool safety, domestic violence, and a tour of the Law Enforcement Center.

We are currently serving 10 youth in our special needs afterschool program and 28 youth in oursupplemental services after-school program. We are proud to be the first Kids Café and Backpackprogram in the Upstate. These programs provide hot meals to the youth enrolled in the programand allow them to take food home so they will have a healthy, nutritious meal at home whenschool is out.