As the 2024-25 school year gets under way, Junius Ward Johnson Memorial YMCA will serve as the host site for a community-wide time of prayer for local schools Sunday at 3 p.m.

Ebony Gardner, lead teacher at River City Early College, began the effort in 2013. 

“I was working at Vicksburg High School and meeting with the teachers every Monday morning,” she said. “We were meeting for prayer. At the time, we were having a lot of issues with behavior at school, fights. It just seemed like things were taking a turn for the worst.”

Gardner said she felt God was telling her to get the kids involved. She turned to the Bible, and the passage from Proverbs 22, “train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.”

The first year, they met on the track at VHS. 

“I put it out on Facebook and tagged my friends,” she explained. “I asked if they would bring their kids to pray. They were lined up from one end of the track to the other. Kids of all ages.

“We had kids from as small as Kindergarten and pre-k all the way up to those who had gone to college and wanted to come back and pray. It has created an opportunity and a space for our community to come together. It’s all schools in Vicksburg-Warren School District, it’s Porter’s Chapel; it’s St. Al, St. Francis; all of the private schools and the public schools in the area.”  

Gardner prays each year and asks God if he wants her to continue. This year, Gardner said God told her “don’t abandon the assignment.”

Gardner recalled past prayer days. 

“I’d always had it at Vicksburg (High School), because that’s just where it started, where I was working, and it was easiest for me. During Covid, we held it at Central Office, outside.”

As attendance grew, Gardner sought to find a neutral place where everyone, including the private schools, would feel comfortable. The YMCA came to mind, and she reached out to YMCA Executive Director Phillip Doiron.

“I asked if that was something they would allow, and they were more than happy to accommodate us.”

This year, the event will be held inside the new Gage Gym at the YMCA, to provide relief from the heat.

Although Gardner continues to organize the time of prayer, she credits local pastors and her family for providing a lot of support, and emphasizes she could not do it without their help.

The meeting is open to anyone. 

“It’s been teachers, it’s students, parents, members of the clergy. Last year, we had quite a few of our city officials to come out and pray. School board members have come. Anybody that wants to come and join in prayer.

“The main goal is to get children there, to provide them the opportunity to pray,” Gardner said.

She added any students who are interested in helping lead prayer may email her directly at tenise02@gmail.com.