Youth Council Info Cancel Se requiere un título

Each agency Youth Council is awarded an average Youth Empowerment Fund of $20,000. Under the supervision of agency staff, councilmembers manage the fund and plan and budget for projects. They first assess needs within their communities by conducting surveys and interviews with residents and public officials before drafting, reviewing and selecting project proposals to implement.

Then they enlist the help of volunteers and seek out support from local partners to implement and evaluate the projects upon completion. Each youth council will typically implement 7 to 12 projects, which can include neighborhood clean-up projects,volunteering at hospitals and schools, donating supplies and materials to orphanages and schools. Also youth will plan and sponsor community building events such as teaching arts (traditional dance,music lessons) and handicraft fairs.

Youth come up with a project plan, which includes a project statement,the goal of the project, how they will know if it’s successful, timeline and budget.  Once the plans are presented, they are then voted on. Whichever projects are approved are then implemented under the rigorous monitoring and evaluation plan required of all our programs.

To be eligible to be elected to the Youth Council, individuals must have completed the year-long Youth Leadership Training, which provides children and youth with a hands-on learning experience so that they can practice important life skills, including interpersonal communication, public speaking, teamwork, problem analysis and decision making, conflict resolution and resource management.

They learn the meaning of leadership and how to identify and strengthen leadership qualities in themselves and in their peers. Youth trainees also investigate and evaluate community problems and then identify possible solutions, and analyze the resources required to implement those solutions. The culminating activity for the youth participants is the implementation of a small-scale community service activity.

You can see how it is through the YLT program that youth learn about project management principles which prepares them to implement the community projects in the Youth Council.

Each agency implements their Youth Councils according to what works best in their communities. The most common methods are either a YC per SAC (community center) or one centralized YC which brings youth from each SAC together to serve the entire SOA.

Agencies may have anywhere from 50 to 1,000 youth on the youth council (depending on which structure they are using). The youth typically implement 7 to 12 projects, and recruit peers and other community members to assist in their projects.

The number per project really depends on what project they are implementing. Some might need a low number (delivery supplies, etc.), while others might need a few hundred (community clean-up).