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History of the Center
The Little Willie Center Covenant
The Little Willie Center was organized in 1990 as a grass roots effort to address the needs of Latchkey children, whose parents work, seek employment, or attend school and as a result, must leave their children home Alone.
The center meets the needs of the children ages 3-17 by providing after school tutoring and mentoring services, Monday through Friday from 2:30pm – 6:30pm during the school year and a summer camp from 10:00am – 2:00pm with off-site recreational activities.
The center has successfully operated for the past 14 years, standing strong through adversity and continues to fill in the gap for our children in good times or bad. The center is located at 807 Martin Luther King Jr. Drive in the heart of West Greenville. Regardless of West Greenville’s reputation, the center provides a safe alternative to being home alone. Knowing this, parents are granted peace of mind knowing their children are loved and encouraged to strive for excellence in their school and personal lives.
Our volunteers are ordinary people with God-given gifts, from college students, retired educators, medical students, sorority and fraternity members, ministers, manufacturing workers, administrators, housewives, and community leaders. Our staff has donated their time for the past 13 years and these are professionals who hold degrees in Human Services, Business Administration, Education and Mental Health.
The center provides services for free to children who are enrolled. We realize that some of our parents are low income and cannot afford childcare services. Therefore, they make choices of leaving their children home alone instead. Our founder came up with a way the parents could give something back to the community, enhance their parenting skills, and also compensate the Center for helping them. That is, every parent must volunteer two hours every week in the center, attend Basic Adult Education classes (taught at our center by an instructor from Pitt Community College) and attend monthly Parents Meetings (PIT Program).
Other services we offer are tutoring/mentoring, transportation, nutritious meals, survival skill classes, PSR Big Buddy Program (ECU Medical School), Girl Scouts of America, Boy Scouts of America, 4-H Club, LWC Ensemble (Vocal Group), Praise Ministry I & II Dancers, and Bible Study.
Awards/Recognition
-Presidential Volunteer Award, Presented by President Clinton at the White House. (1996)
-Governor’s Helping Hands Award, One of the eight exemplary volunteer programs in the State of North Carolina, presented by Governor Hunt. (1998)
-2006 Citizen of the Year Award presented to Founder, Renee Arrington by Pitt County Chamber of Commerce.
Sponsors
The center would not exist without the hand of God resting upon it and the unselfish generosity of His people, some who remain anonymous to this day.
The center salutes Roger Johnson, N’ Step Shoes for raising funds for our Summer Camp 2000.
The center salutes US Cellular for the remote fundraiser for our 2007 Summer Camp program. (We would like to thank all contributors through the radio broadcast.)
Board of Directors
*The Little Willie Center will be recruiting for new board members from January-November 2008. If you are interested, please contact Renee Arrington at (252) 752-9083.
Marvin Arrington, Jr., Chairman
Rodger Harris, Vice President
Vernestine Paige, Secretary
Todd Johnson, Financial Officer
Titus Wooten, Youth Advisor
Holly Garris , Public Relations
Dee Taylor , Fundraising
Rebecca Post, Grantwriter
Monica Macedon, Technical Support
Board of Advisors
Congresswoman Eva Clayton
Congressman Walter B. Jones, Jr.
Former Councilman, Ray Craft
Dr. Tom Ions
Father, Bob Hudak
Wes Singleton
Bill Clark
Mike Aldridge
Marvin Staten
Tax Forms
Tax Form 2006
Tax Form 2005
Tax Form 2004
Tax Form 2003
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