Shaping America's Youth - About Project S.A.Y.

Project S.A.Y.

Shaping America’s Youth

Other activities and programs that will be offered as apart of our program in addition found on our home page will be thefollowing:

Completing college/university applications
Completing financial aid forms and applying for scholarships and grants
Deciding career paths and how to precede
Applying for a job and learning the “Do’s and Don’ts” on a job interview
Building up their self esteem
Learning how to resolve conflicts through conflict resolutions
Improving behavior and academic goals to ensure their success in school

The Data

Project S.A.Y.,will be established in two major cities; Chicago, Ill and Atlanta, Ga. We have chosen these two places to help “at risk” youths because of the enormous need for minority teenagers. We want this group of young adults to have a positive place to go and to feel safe while learning how to improve their quality of life through the programs we will offer and the mentors who will be apart of their lives.

Chicago has been the source of many major headline stories where youth violence and public school children had either been the victim of violence or have been the perpetrators. Many of the victims and offenders are minorities who live in areas with high employment and lower incomes than in other parts of the city. Many of these youths attend high schools in low income areas where the graduation rate is around 50% even though the average graduation rate in Chicago is 85%. The attendance rate is also low in these neighborhoods which hovers around 56 % while the average rate of attendance for all CPS high school students is a little more than 86%.

The percentage of African-American students in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) is 45%, for Hispanics it is 41% and for white students it is 9%. However, the percentage of African-American teachers at CPS is 31%, for Hispanic teachers it is 15% but the percentage of white teachers is 52.3%.* African-American and Hispanic students are more likely to have less contact with a teacher of their ethnicity and race more so than for white students, though white students make up only 9% of the student population.

*( Information provided by Chicago Public Schools’ data).

In the city of Atlanta, the minority rate has grown, surpassing the white population in and around the metropolitan area. However, the divide between whites, blacks and Hispanic students’ academic growth is great. The total percentage of children in the Atlanta School System who are low income is 76%. Currently the percentage of African-American students is 85%, whites 8% and the Hispanic student population is at 4%. African American and Hispanic children are less likely to graduate than their white counterpart in the Atlanta School System.

*(Information provided by Atlanta School System)

The Program

Our tentative date to open our foundation is for the fall, 2012. The hours for our programs and activities will be for 2 hours daily, (Beginning after school) from 2:00 p.m. until 4 p.m. The days set for the mentoring program will be bn regular school days, Monday through Friday. We will also offer our mentoring program on Saturday from 9:00 a.m. until 12:00 p.m. Our mentors will work with their mentees at least 2 hours a week and will based on the mentors availability. If mentors can and are able to give additional time, it will be greatly appreciated.We will also have a social worker and a nurse who will volunteer some of their time to the centers . They will work with the youths at least twice a week, 2 hours a week.

The program will take initially 10 high school youths in each site which makes the number of youth receiving assistance and guidance, 30. We will have 10 mentors at each site, male and female, that will be matched with no more than two of youths in the program. Our mentors will be from all sectors of the communities. As time and needs grow, we will accept more mentees and recruit more mentors.

An application process will be available to any youth who wish to participate in the programs that will be offered at our future sites. Applications will be made available at many of the high schools where we want to reach students who would like to join and be apart of our foundation and programs.

In addition, we will build relationships with many of the neighborhood churches in these communities. This will assist us by making sure that any youth and their parent/guardian who wants to apply may do so.

The applicants that are accepted into our program will be based on teacher and school recommendations and the strong interest shown by the youth in a one page essay they will write as part of the application process. Students who will be eligible will be youths who are of the ages of 12 to 19 years old and are a minority; males and females. All applicants will be notified by email and in writing and sent via the US Postal Service if they have been accepted or have been placed on our waiting list. The letter will notified the youth and their parent/guardian of the time and days of the week the program is to begin and end. High schoolers and their parent/guardian can decide how many days of the week they can attend. However, the mentees must come at least 3 days a week. If a mentee has 3 unexcused absents, they and their parent/guardian will be notified explaining why they, (the youth) and their child has been dropped from the program.