ARCHIVED BLOG
Going Back to School with National Service
Improving student success from preschool to graduation
The familiar sights and sounds of back to school are in full swing across the nation. And as students returned to their classrooms, Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) AmeriCorps and Senior Corps members joined them on this journey … and will follow them from preschool until graduation and beyond to help them reach their educational and career goals.
No one will dispute the importance of education in the lives of America’s youth – it is the cornerstone upon which all the other building blocks of success are laid.
With this in mind, CNCS allocates more than half of our budget to support educational initiatives with results-driven service to strengthen schools while meeting community needs.
How do we do that?
SIF Builds: Empowering Opportunity Youth
Franklin D. Roosevelt once said, “We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future.” That’s especially true for the 5.5 million opportunity youth – teenagers and young people who are neither working nor in school.[i] Youth development and improving economic opportunity are important targets for the Social Innovation Fund (SIF), and our grantees have been able to make a significant impact in the communities they serve.
YouthBuild Opens Doors to Opportunity and Success
Here’s a great clip about AmeriCorps grantee YouthBuild and how the program helped transform the life of a high school dropout and teen mom.
(Source: youtube.com)
View MoreGetting Started with the Social Innovation Fund
How YouthBuild AmeriCorps Transforms Homes and the Lives of Opportunity Youth
We found two great stories that highlight the YouthBuild program and how it is providing hope to opportunity youth in St. Louis and Los Angeles. (YouthBuild is a grantee of the Corporation for National and Community Service.)
In YouthBuild AmeriCorps programs, low-income young people ages 16 to 24 work full-time for 6 to 24 months toward their GEDs or high school diplomas while learning job skills by building affordable housing in their communities. Their service often transforms the lives of the members participating, helping them learn new skills and giving them hope for a brighter future. At the end of their term, they are placed in college, jobs, or both; and they become eligible for a Segal AmeriCorps Education Award to help them continue their education.
Read the article about St. Louis YouthBuild
Read the Huffington Post blog about R.U.T.H. YouthBuild in Los Angeles
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