The Beat: Positive Youth Development
Know any young people looking for a job? If you work with youth, the answer is probably yes. Young Americans today face record unemployment.
To help young people get jobs, earn wages and build skills that will make them more competitive in the job market, the Department of Labor is working with businesses and non-profits across the country to launch the Summer Jobs+ Bank, a White House initiative. The bank allows businesses to register new jobs in a searchable directory that young people can use to find work in their communities.
You or your youth can get started by searching the job bank right now! Just use the form below:
More from NCFY about youth employment
...This winter, runaway and homeless youth programs funded by the Family and Youth Services Bureau were given the chance to win the materials to paint a mural in their facilities. Here are the essay and artwork submitted by the first place winner, the Colorado Rural Collaborative Youth Leadership Team.
What is the Colorado Mural Project?
Each year the month of November is "National Homeless Youth Awareness Month." Agencies across the nation hold events and host rallies to raise awareness in their communities about this ongoing problem. The month's events include proclamations signed by local government...
In February, the Guttmacher Institute released “Facts on American Teens' Sexual and Reproductive Health,” a survey of over two-dozen recent studies and publications on the topic of adolescent sexual behavior. This is the first such survey from the Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit that promotes sexual and reproductive health, since 2009.
Laura Lindberg, a senior research associate at Guttmacher, spoke with NCFY about the report’s implications for youth workers and organizations that aim to prevent teen preganancy.
NCFY: Can you summarize the general trends in teen pregnancy and contraception?
LINDBERG: The major trends are first, a decline in teen pregnancy over the last two decades. It’s been declining relatively steadily since a high in 1991. And second, there has been a slight delay in the onset of sexual activity—that is, teens are waiting longer to have sex. I use the word “...
This winter, runaway and homeless youth programs funded by the Family and Youth Services Bureau were given the chance to win the materials to paint a mural in their facilities. In a series of Beat posts, we recognize the runners-up and the winner. Here are the essay and artwork submitted by the second-place winner, Sea Haven Transitional Living Program Junior Advisory Team, in Horry County, SC.
They say a picture is worth a thousand words. This is what the Junior Advisory team tried do when we discovered the mural contest. Create a piece of artwork that needed no explaining but speaks for itself. I think that our goal was achieved.
We are the Junior Advisory Team for Sea Haven’s transitional living program, an organization created to help teen runaways ages...
This winter, runaway and homeless youth programs funded by the Family and Youth Services Bureau were given the chance to win the materials to paint a mural in their facilities. In a series of Beat posts, we recognize the runners-up and the winner. Here are the essay and artwork submitted by the third-place winner, Sasha Bruce Youthwork, in Washington, DC.
Sasha Bruce Youthwork is submitting a design created by youth in the art therapy group at the Sasha Bruce House: DC’s only short-term shelter for young people. Sasha Bruce House provides a safe place to stay and intensive counseling services. Sasha Bruce House helps most youth reunite with their families and works to return all young people to stable and safe environments. The art therapy group meets twice a week and is comprised of youth currently...
NCFY's new video series features seven youth workers from around the country, each sharing a time when they made a big difference in a young person's life.
Lynze Bolton works for First Chance/Y-CHOW in San Bernardino, CA. In his video, he remembers handing a business card to a young man who needed help. Before long, the young man had completely turned his life around.
The "When Did You Make the Biggest Difference in a Young Person's Life?" video series was shot in Portland, OR, during the 2011 National Runaway and Homeless Youth Family and Youth Services Bureau Grantee Conference in November. A complementary series titled "What's Your Most Meaningful Relationship?" features formerly homeless and foster young people talking about the most essential people in their lives.
...
There’s often a special connection between animals and their caretakers. Penny Ellison, who directs the Hand2Paw Foundation in Philadelphia, sees it every day. Hand2Paw empowers young adults from Covenant House Pennsylvania to volunteer in local animal shelters and help care for homeless pets.
Young people help feed the animals, exercise dogs, and stock food and water. Ellison says, “I’ve seen big guys, who say they don’t like cats, melt when they feed the baby kittens.”
Youth from Covenant House feel a certain kinship with the animals, because they too are homeless, she says, and harnessing that special bond can benefit both the young people and the animals they care for. Youth gain skills and build their resumes. Animals may be more likely to be adopted into a...
Meet Craig, resident-turned-intern at Sea Haven for Youth, a runaway and homeless youth program in North Myrtle Beach, SC.
Craig’s a college student working on a degree in human services. In his spare time, he performs comedy. As Sea Haven’s transitional living program intern, he helps with the tasks needed to take in new clients, like filling out forms and telling youth about the program’s policies and procedures. Sometimes, he goes to local high schools to talk to teens about Sea Haven and how it can help them. He also does things like answering the phones and filing.
Finding—and keeping—a part-time or summer job can be stressful for young people, especially those who are learning to live independently after having been homeless. NCFY is following Craig’s experience over the next few months to give a snapshot of the ups and downs of summer employment for young people in runaway and homeless youth programs.
Benefits of Interning
Melissa McGrath, director of the transitional living program...
NCFY's new video series features seven youth workers from around the country, each sharing a time when they made a big difference in a young person's life.
Shane Burroughs, from Valley Youth House in Allentown, PA, told the story of a teen mother who achieved newfound stability after staying at his organization's rapid re-housing program, which finds stable homes for homeless youth as quickly as possible.
The "When Did You Make the Biggest Difference in a Young Person's Life?" video series was shot in Portland, OR, during the 2011 National Runaway and Homeless Youth Family and Youth Services Bureau Grantee Conference in November. A complementary series titled "What's Your Most Meaningful Relationship?" features formerly homeless young people talking about the most essential people in their lives.
...
Poetry is powerful. Clinical psychologist Rebecca Chalmers sees that power whenever she uses poetry as a therapeutic tool.
“When young people share a poem they’ve written, and everyone says that it’s beautiful, that’s supporting who they are and how they’re able to intellectually and emotionally express themselves, and that feels so good,” says Chalmers, who practices in New York and has a Master of Fine Arts in poetry.
As a mode of expression, poetry is tailor-made for teens. “Poetry is very immediate and about the self and helps sort out ‘who I am’ in a way that speaks to them,” Chalmers says. And working on poetry with a group of other youth can feed teens’ need to relate, she says. “By the time they’ve written something and shared it with other group members and gotten that supportive feedback, they form such a bond.”
April is National Poetry Month, and what better way to celebrate than by creating poetry with the young people you work with? Here are Chalmers...
