The Youth Empowerment Strategies Summer Program 2010

"Youth 'n Action" program

This Summer YES is collaborating with DBHR, 4H and the University of Washington to develop the infrastructure of a "Youth 'n Action" program. The YNA model is designed to empower youth with the resources and tools required to:

    * Advocate successfully to meet their needs in education, treatment, mental wellness, and overall health and happiness

    * Understand their rights and responsibilities in government

    * Participate in fun activities

    * Support and encourage one another

 

Some of the programs for summer 2010 are:


  songwriting & documentary production workshop
A songwriting/ documentary making workshop that includes doing group processing around how mental health issues, drug, alcohol etc have affected lives of family, friends, community  etc , poetry/lyric writing workshops to put those thoughts into words, an introduction to musical styles and combining content, lyrics, audience, culture  and musical  tastes, music writing workshops and a week or so of studio recording time  to record the songs to CD. Meanwhile a group will shoot video, interview and document this process then edit together a film about the whole thing which we can put on the local cable channel. The culmination will be a CD/ documentary release party.

 

  community gardens
 We have started community gardens here in Shelton so young people can work in the gardens and enjoy the dirt while getting some gardening skills and experience. Young people can take home food and feed their families. They can also have a booth at the local farmers market to sell herbs, veggies and flowers to bolster their project bank account and use the money for field trips or future projects.

 We also have the green house project at Fir Lane Convalescent Center to bring plants to the elders there.

 
 video projects
We have already started shooting the initial footage for the documentary about the community garden project.
(It might be fun to make a film about young people growing healthy food, feeding families and raising  nutritional awareness to show to Michelle Obama.)

We are also currently working on a film about youth homelessness. We are interviewing youth, homeless advocates, government officials as well as displaced young people.


  “YES Re-cycle” Bike Shop
The “YES Re-cycle” Bike Shop, is a Youth Entrepreneurship program started in the summer of 2009, in conjunction with ESD 113 and Mason County Youth Programs. This start-up bike shop collects used and broken bikes furnished by the Bicycle Alliance of Washington and the community to refurbish and give to needy community members. The bike shop employs youth, under supervision, to repair, rebuild, and recycle the bikes.

In the future, we plan to turn this into a for-profit operation, managed and operated by youth. This would provide hands-on skills in not just bike repair, but also in what it takes to operate a small business.

 This summer the bike shop will continue collecting and fixing up bikes to give away to the community. We have already distributed close to 100 bikes.

We would also like to start a bike club this summer.

Free Summer Breakfast Program For Kids