Kidstop Program Marks Four Decades Of Serving Our Community

ST. CLOUD (WJON News) -- The Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Minnesota is celebrating the 40th anniversary of its groundbreaking Kidstop program. In the fall of 1985, two pilot programs, Kidstop South and Kidstop East, opened with 78 children.

Spokeswoman Aimee Minnerath says it didn't take long to expand the program.

And then other schools in the St. Cloud school district, and Sartell and Sauk Rapids, said, "hey, we want this program in our schools as well."  So, within a couple of years we had 11 Kidstop sites open.

Kidstop grew into the Sauk Rapids-Rice School District in 1986, Sartell-St. Stephen in 1990, and ROCORI in 2010. This year, they also launched two new locations in the Little Falls School District. They currently serve nearly 1,700 registered members in 13 schools.

Minnerath says they were the first Boys and Girls Club in the country to offer this type of programming, and they own the trade on the name.

Our leaders had the forethought to get that name trademarked.  Other Boys and Girls Clubs and other organizations in other communities have requested use of that trademark name, so if you see Kidstops in other communities, it's because they got permission to use it.  So, kinda cool.

Today, more than 2,500 Boys and Girls Clubs operate in schools nationwide, modeled after what was started here.

The Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Minnesota runs the Kidstop program, providing after-school care in schools.

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Kidstop is available to Kindergarten through 6th graders.  Kidstop is open from school dismissal until 6:00 p.m. during the school year, and from 6:30 a.m. until 6:30 p.m. during the summer and non-school days.  Kidstop has a daily fee. Kidstop is classified as custodial care.

The Boys and Girls Clubs are available for Kindergarten through 12th graders in buildings owned by the Clubs.  The clubs are open from school dismissal until 7:00 p.m. for K-5th grade, and until 8:00 p.m. for 6-12th grade.  The clubs are 100 percent free. The clubs are classified as drop-in care.