History and Purpose

Youth ImPact Windham County, launched in January of 2008 by New England Network for Child, Youth & Family Services, (NEN), brings youth-service providers and the local faith community together to share knowledge, skills and resources to create initiatives that reduce incidents of youth violence while simultaneously building their assets necessary for positive youth development.

As an often untapped resource for young people, faith-based organizations have many assets to bring to our project development. Funded by federal monies from the Compassion Capital Fund, the project stresses community change through capacity-building, not direct services. Capacity-building is a process of implementing activities critical to the long-term viability of an organization. It helps organizations to become more effective service providers and create more sustainable services. Local partners in Youth ImPact are Youth Services Inc. of Windham County, Boys & Girls Club of Brattleboro, the Guilford Community Church, and Vermont Independent Media.

We've spent the first several months finding out what young people in the county think is working well for them, and what they think needs to be improved. We've also collected data on the well-being of youth from county, state and federal sources. The needs we identify, along with the interests of the project partners, will become the basis for the projects the collaboration takes on.

As we work to grow individual partner capacity and creating collaborative initiatives, we try to:

• encourage community collaboration whenever possible
• remind ourselves that sustainability has to be an essential part of project planning by always asking the question, "How can we make this last beyond the current funding?"
• provide opportunities for youth participation on many levels and in many roles
• aim toward the inclusion of county wide service provision (replicable in other communities or serving the broader county)

Opportunities for Growth

Through our county-wide needs assessment, we've identified several potential areas of work that are based what the community says it needs, and what our partners say they'd like to do. They include:

• Youth say they don't have meaningful volunteer opportunities; in the meantime, the faith community has an ongoing need for volunteers that goes unmet. Youth ImPact can, among other things, act as an intermediary to make connections that will be fruitful for all parties, helping put processes in place that allow young people to connect with adults around useful projects.
  
  
• The local Boys and Girls Club and Big Brothers/Big Sisters Program always needs adult mentors; Youth Services always needs "host homes" for youth in crisis who need to spend a few days away from home. The faith community is willing to do this work; the connection and planning simply needs to be done.
  
  
• Our collaborative can work with other groups to reactivate the Windham County Youth Council and provide capacity-building around developing and nurturing youth-adult partnerships
  
  
• Our collaboration can design a food access initiative in the rural areas, which do not have food pantries and have difficulties getting to the urban food banks
  
  
• Our collaborative can educate community partners about youth-adult partnerships and begin involving young people in relevant and meaningful ways in the planning and implementation of services.
  
  
• Our collaboration can create a structure, which will facilitate an increase in communication across populations, geographic areas, and service areas through meetings, newsletters, and formalized partnerships.
  
  
• Our collaborative can explore expansion of services to more rural areas of Windham County while simultaneously exploring increasing transportation options to Brattleboro from the rural areas of the county.