Blog & News

This fall, Goddard Riverside Community Center celebrates an extraordinary 30-year partnership with the publishing industry—one that has powered our anti-homelessness programs and profoundly shaped our growth as an organization. In 1987, the closure of psychiatric institutions, combined with a lack of affordable housing, left thousands of people homeless in New York City. Many wound up […]

As some 20 young people sort themselves into four groups at Goddard Riverside’s inaugural Performing Arts Camp, visiting dance instructor Carina Rubaja explains their assignment. “I’m going to say All Go or All Stop,” she says. “Or I might call your group number: One Go. Two Stop. Got it?” Everyone nods. “Thanks for listening!” Rubaja […]

Goddard Riverside Law Project took action on Tuesday to stop the landlord of an Upper West Side building from illegally renting out apartments as hotel rooms. Imperial Court, a Single Room Occupancy building at 307 West 79th Street, cannot legally rent out units for less than 30 days at a time. Nonetheless, landlord Michael Edelstein frequently rents rooms […]

More than 20 members of our TOP OP employment support program showed up early and eager for a workshop with employees of Deloitte on Friday. Volunteers from the global consulting and accounting powerhouse came to the Bernie Wohl Center to share job interview and resume writing advice, and conduct practice interviews. The volunteers started with […]

Michelle Obama was greeted by thousands of screaming high school seniors— including some from our Options Center—when she came to Harlem last week. The First Lady was celebrating College Signing Day, an initiative she launched and has championed for the last two years. High-profile athletes aren’t the only ones who should be celebrated when they […]

What are the barriers that keep some New Yorkers from attending and completing college? And how can we break those barriers down? That’s the focus of #DegreesNYC, an exciting new effort led by our Options Center in partnership with Young Invincibles and GraduateNYC. The numbers are sobering. City-wide, 57% of white adults have a bachelor’s degree—well […]

It’s not unusual to hear music pouring from the main room of our Senior Center. It happens during the monthly birthday parties, and for exercise classes like Movement Speaks and Zumba. Music also spices up holiday celebrations like the Halloween costume contest. But there’s a very special kind of music that happens when musician and […]

Goddard Riverside Community Center Executive Director Stephan Russo expressed deep appreciation on receiving the Community Free Democrats’ Distinguished Community Leader Award on Sunday. “I’m very humbled,” said Russo. “And this is really quite an honor, because even though I’ve been in the neighborhood for 40 years and seen the changes on the West Side, there […]

Employment Dinner Recognizes TOP Achievements Eleven years ago, Polo Seda was having a tough time. Unemployed and on the street, he took a chance on an offer of help. “I was homeless and an outreach van came around. I decided to give it a try,” he recalled at the TOP Clubhouse, our psychosocial clubhouse for […]

Nelly Gomez has a six-year plan. (“She’s one of those people,” says her twin sister Angelica, the way twin sisters do.) The SUNY-Plattsburgh junior is triple-majoring in Multimedia Journalism, Magazine Journalism and Graphic Design. She’s hoping to move to Japan after graduation, teach English, and work for an English-language magazine in Tokyo. Why Japan?  “We’re […]