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Vision Youth
The teenaged girl was struggling in school, surly, and even feared by some teachers for her volatile temper. She failed to turn in assignments and she was all too familiar with detention. She was a hard case—and she was still in middle school.But Bronwyn Talaga saw a bright child behind the angry face, and signs of a natural leader. She made an investment no one else had been willing to make. Each day Bronwyn, a Vision Youth outreach worker at Jubilee Christian Center in Seattle, met with the girl, helping her refocus when her anger began to boil. She worked evenings and weekends with the girl to meet deadlines for big projects.
Bronwyn’s investment showed dividends. Assignments were done on time. The once-struggling student managed a B average while becoming a leader on her school volleyball team. One teacher described her as a “delight to have in class.”
Vision Youth
It’s probably safe to say that this girl wouldn’t have the promising future she does today if Bronywn hadn’t entered her life.
Vision Youth is World Vision’s response to the unforgiving cycle of poverty in the United States. It is a youth-focused initiative that develops strong local leaders among youth who can work to bring hope to their impoverished communities.
At the core of Vision Youth are youth outreach workers, compassionate adults from the community who know the challenges and issues young people face, and who are committed to providing a caring, stable influence in their lives. They are based in local churches, which often are the only stable institutions in depressed neighborhoods. Vision Youth not only trains these outreach workers, but also offers technical assistance to pastors and congregations that helps enhance and broaden their involvement with neighborhood families in need.
Outreach workers also recruit and train volunteers who are willing to help carry the burden for these high-risk youth. And most importantly, they provide partner churches with a staff member who can devote his or her energies full time to youth outreach.
Vision Youth helps to pay outreach worker salaries for the first five years (on a descending scale), while providing training to partner churches on how to financially support the program and make it a sustainable, long-term agent of change.
Education—The Firm Foundation
When fully implemented, Vision Youth begins its journey with children when they are young by matching struggling elementary school students with trained tutors and mentors from partner churches and community organizations. These tutors provide not only academic help, but also emotional nurture and sometimes the only consistent, supportive adult influence in these youngsters’ lives.
As young people mature, their needs change, and outreach workers take their ministry to parks, schools, juvenile detention halls, and the streets––wherever troubled youth are found. They provide strong role models and the influence of a caring adult who can help young people succeed in school and set goals for the future. They help youth find resources to follow through on those goals, whether it’s through mentoring, or a referral to an academic specialist, drug-treatment program, counseling, or job training.
The ultimate goal is to help young people grow into healthy, successful adults, and remain in their communities to share with others the hope and promise they have received.
Achievements
In 2002, Vision Youth touched the lives of more than 20,000 young people across the United States, whether through mentoring youth or tutoring programs for elementary students. The program, which was piloted in the Seattle-Tacoma area, was replicated in Albany, Georgia; Appalachia (West Virginia); Chicago; Los Angeles; Minneapolis-St. Paul; New York; and Washington, D.C. Sixty-four Vision Youth outreach workers are serving youth through churches and community organizations across the nation.
How You Can Help
Volunteers and outreach workers provide young people with guidance and a caring relationship, which often is lacking in their lives, and the most important gift—hope. Here’s how your support can help:
· $30,000 provides one year of funding for a full-time Youth Outreach Worker, who can be a positive influence in the lives of approximately 100 young people.
· $5,000 funds in-depth program activities—such as academic and personal mentoring, life-skills training and leadership development—for 25 high-risk young people.
· $495 provides tutoring for one child for one year.
For more information on Vision Youth and how you can support this life-changing ministry to children and youth, contact Evie Green at 253-815-2078 or evgreen@worldvision.org
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| Vision Youth Help provide tutoring, life skills training, and a caring relationship to high-risk youth. | | ||
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| The Storehouse Provide school supplies, clothes, toys, household goods and building supplies for strengthening families,schools and neighborhoods. | | ||
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| Tools for Transformation Help provide the organizational, planning and leadership tools to transform a neighborhood. | | ||
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Read about what is happening in Vision Youth programs around the country by clicking on the location name below. |
