[caption id="attachment_5498" align="alignright" width="500" caption="U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas), presented the center with a Congressional Certificate of Recognition praising the center's community efforts and acknowleding the collaboration between the center and Buckner. Accepting the recognition from Lee, center, are Aldine center founder Sylvia Bolling, left, and Buckner International President and CEO Albert L. Reyes."][/caption]

Buckner staff report



HOUSTON – Aldine YOUTH Center, which has served the Aldine community north of Houston since 1990, has joined forces with Buckner International to become the Aldine Community Transformation Center.

The center will continue its mission of working as a “vehicle and catalyst for positive transformation and restoration in our community,” according to the director and founder, Sylvia Bolling.

“The opportunity to join forces with Buckner means our center and the programs we offer to the community will become stronger,” Bolling said. “This move propels us into the future.”

As part of the move to Buckner, the center’s name will change to Aldine Community Transformation Center. Bolling and officials with Buckner said the name better reflects the broad range of services the center offers the community. Buckner operates CTCs in nine countries, including four in the United States.

The Aldine CTC will continue offering most of its current programs. Those services are designed to meet a diversity of needs in the community, including English as a Second Language (ESL), GED classes, family counseling, a food pantry, after-school and summer programs for youth, programs for senior adults, computer classes and job training.

“The Aldine CTC is a great addition to our ministries,” said Albert Reyes, president of Buckner. “The goal and mission of Buckner is to transform the lives of people we serve. That is exactly what Sylvia Bolling and the Aldine center have been doing for 22 years.”

Reyes said Buckner hopes to augment the work of the Aldine CTC and provide added resources for future growth and expansion of the program.

“The center has such a powerful presence in the Aldine community,” Reyes said. “It has demonstrated over and over consistent, high-quality programs that support and provide restoration for the families it serves.”

Founded in 1990, the Aldine center serves about 5,000 households in an area encompassing a two-mile radius of U.S. Highway 59 North and Aldine Mail Route. The service area includes 12 schools, five subdivisions, seven apartment complexes and several businesses and churches. About 85 percent of the students living in the area are considered economically disadvantaged.