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BRICK (Building Resilient Intelligent Creative Kids) Education Network, a charter management organization based in Newark, New Jersey, invests in children and their caregivers together to relentlessly knock down all barriers to students’ academic success.

In 2010, Teach for America alumnus Dominique Lee, deeply motivated to create more academic opportunity for the largely Black and brown student population in the South Ward of Newark, decided it was time for teachers to take charge in creating change for youth. He recruited five other Teach for America alumni for this labor of love. Together, in partnership with the Newark Public Schools, the group successfully turned around two underperforming traditional public schools. BEN then chartered a new public school, Achieve Community Charter School, to further serve kids in the South Ward.

In 2019, the historic Marion P. Thomas Charter School, joined the BRICK Education Network to support its mission to prepare students for college, career, and life.

Though students’ subject mastery and scores soared, too often their learning was interrupted by out of school factors, such as under addressed physical or emotional health challenges, unstable housing or hunger. BEN leaders knew that to create lasting change for students, they needed to stabilize families.

The team then launched the BRICK Family Allies division to partner with parents and caregivers to support their children as scholars – beginning at birth. The BRICK Family Ally in the South Ward, the South Ward Children’s Alliance, connect families with community resources and create original programming that caregivers need for their children to thrive in both school and life.

Today, BEN continues to combine an innovative schooling model that aligns an excellent education with the necessary supports outside of the classroom for students to succeed.

OUR GOAL is that all children have an unimpeded path to...

Impact

Students at BRICK schools are growing leaps and bounds. Consider our Achieve Community Charter School Kindergarten scholars’ outcomes for the 2017-2018 school year:

Math
82% scored over 50th achievement percentile
85% scored over 50th growth percentile

English Language Arts
92% scored over 50th achievement percentile
94% scored over 50th growth percentile