Summer Club Attendance Reaches All-Time High

Summer has typically been a quieter season at the Boys & Girls Club of the HI-Line.

Not so this year.

For the first time in the Club’s history, summer Club registrations equaled school year registrations, and attendance in June averaged 150 kids per day (only marginally lower than the average 198 during the school year).

"Every center is busy, and kids of all ages are here,” said Club Director Tim Brurud. "Lots of new faces too, kids that we don’t see during the school year.”

Tim attributes the growth to three factors.

First, in the past several years the Club has increased publicity for summer programming, and numbers have risen steadily.

The Club also instated its free summer lunch program in 2008. In the past three years, the Club has gone from serving 45 lunches per day to over 100 in 2011.

Finally, bus transportation by Montana Transit has made getting to the Club easy. Ridership doubled in 2011 to an average of 50 members per day.

Attendance dipped slightly in July and again in August, but stayed strong with an average 130 members attending the Club each day.

"It’s great,” said Tim. "The Club is here to serve as many kids as we can.”