Highlighting JLC Community Impact through the Years: Part 3, 1980 - 2000

By: Mallory Pearce

For nearly a century, the Junior League of Charlotte, Inc. (JLC) has identified opportunity areas in Mecklenburg County and mobilized volunteers to make a lasting impact. This series outlines the JLC’s successes through the years surrounding community focus. Thus far, in Part 1 (Fall | Winter 2021-2022) and Part 2 (Spring | Summer 2022), we explored that:

• A 1926 membership vote initiated the founding of a Baby Home to provide a safe place for children without parents.

• Youth art classes, a community theater, a children’s radio broadcast and a junior exhibit at the Mint Museum became family fixtures in the 1940s.

• Thanks to membership, the Children’s Nature Museum initiative was constructed in Freedom Park in 1950, where it still stands just under the new name Discovery Place Nature.

• 1960-1961 fundraising efforts allowed for the hiring of a permanent school psychologist to address mental health for school children.

• The Junior League of Charlotte received numerous Charlotte Observer “Club of the Year Award” accolades in recognition of its commitment to underserved populations.

• In response to an uptick in nationwide substance abuse, the JLC initiated drug education and rehabilitation efforts in the 1970s.

• Junior Leagues across North Carolina banded together to advocate for public kindergartens.

• The JLC surpassed one million dollars donated across Mecklenburg County by 1980.

There has been no shortage of effort aimed at community welfare since 1926, and once the League matured into the 1980s, the pace did not change. For area youth, the JLC pressed for improved teacher-to-student ratios in public schools, quality daycare options for lower-income families and educational opportunities designed to meet the needs of children with disabilities. Donations were made to fund a Suicide Awareness Program, Family Support Center and the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Teen Center to furnish one year’s salary for its first director.

As membership views evolved, the JLC decided to co-sponsor legislation with The Council for Children, a North Carolina Congressional Candidates Forum focusing on children’s issues. League members also approved two projects to allocate $300,000 in funds: the Open House Halfway House for Adolescents and The Children’s Law Center. Working with 22 agencies in 25 placements throughout the community, volunteers contributed a yearly average of 27,000 hours of direct service to Charlotte and surrounding areas.

The League continued to fulfill financial and volunteer commitments benefitting area schoolchildren in the 1990s in the form of classroom assistance for homeless and underprivileged children. Achievements outside the school system included advocating for children under the jurisdiction of the juvenile court, assisting with English language skill-building for speakers of English as a Second Language (ESL), starting a teen health clinic, facilitating dropout prevention programs for high-risk students and establishing a toy lending library for infants and children of young mothers.

Concentrating JLC resources to maximize community impact was the subject of much discussion and planning in the 1990s. This culminated with the selection of JLC Focus Areas that may sound familiar to us today: “Child Health” and “School Readiness.” Thanks to efforts from JLC members, Smart Start North Carolina was able to expand its presence from its original 55 counties to cover the remaining 45 counties. Those programs exist to this day with a mission to prepare underprivileged youth for success when entering the school system.

The Junior League of Charlotte ushered in a new millennium with an emphasis on utilizing more technological resources, restructuring policies and committees, and planning for its 75th-anniversary celebration. There was much to celebrate, indeed. In 1999, President Kathi Miller Knier summed it up well when she recounted that, “as League members this year, we learned about our community and ourselves through our work with those to whom we offered help and those who helped us. We stretched. We grew. And we made our little piece of the world a bit brighter because of our effort.”