New Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. Board Members Affirm Commitment to Institutional Placement Alternatives and Systems Reform
|
Upholding its strategy to expand its proven youth incarceration/institutional placement alternative model while advancing social and justice system reform, Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. has added five more game changers to its Board of Directors.
“We welcome our new board members and are proud of how individually and collectively, they affirm our promise to provide innovation through visionary leadership. These appointments come at a critical juncture, as we strengthen and scale our model,” said YAP Board Chair Lynette Brown-Sow. “We’re also evolving to serve more commercially sexually exploited children, individuals needing workforce skills, youth and families struggling with substance use, LGBTQ youth and young people transitioning out of foster care,” she said.
The addition of new board members comes as the YAP model receives increased recognition for its effectiveness.
|
|
|
|
Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. Celebrates the Success of Individuals, Families and Communities
|
YAP’s programs and outcomes are generating local and national media coverage.
|
CHICAGO
Chicago’s Choose to Change (C2C) program, which in 2015 engaged Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. for an evidence-informed violence reduction pilot program, has received additional support from the Chicago Sports Alliance. C2C is a partnership with YAP, the University of Chicago Crime Lab and Children’s Home and Aid. Youth who have been involved with the juvenile justice system and/or exposed to trauma receive YAP’s intensive, holistic mentorship advocacy, with trauma-informed group therapy provided by Children’s Home and Aid. The University of Chicago Crime Lab found that 18 months after the 2015 launch of C2C, violent crime among participants had been cut in half; and most participants who had previously dropped out of school are attending school again.
|
NEW YORK
On the heels of the release of a report on the effectiveness of YAP’s community-based alternative youth incarceration model, Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. stands ready to assist youth impacted by New York’s Raise-the-Age law. An evaluation released by New York City’s Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity (NYC Opportunity), found the state’s Advocate, Intervene, Mentor (AIM) program reduced justice-involved young people’s risk for recidivism, re-offending and out-of-home placement. YAP’s unique strength-based model is the prototype for AIM. Operating programs throughout the state, YAP is responding to requests to serve Raise-the-Age law-impacted young people across the state with commitments in Clinton, Ontario, Seneca, Sullivan and Wayne counties and an anticipated partnership in St. Lawrence County.
|
GREENVILLE, SOUTH CAROLINA
Greenville Technical College freshman Victoria Foster said just a few years ago, she tried to take her life four times. At a , South Carolina Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. open house, she said YAP empowered her with tools that strengthened her foundation . A recipient of the YAP Tom Jeffers Endowment Fund for Continuing education scholarship, Foster is sharing her story to support the Greenville office’s efforts to expand to serve more youth, adults and families battling behavioral health-related challenges. “YAP gave me so many resources that other counselors haven’t. They come to your home and you become comfortable,” Victoria said. “The biggest difference with YAP is that they grew a relationship with me, my grandmother and everyone in my support network. They really do have open, good hearts.”
|
PHILADELPHIA
Philadelphia Youth Advocate Programs (YAP) Inc.’s Oct. 17 open house brought current and former YAP participants and families together with juvenile justice, social services and other professionals who for four decades have referred thousands of individuals to the program as an alternative to youth prison, detention or other away-from-home placements. Several young people who were served by the program within the past few years received YAP Tom Jeffers Endowment Fund for Continuing education scholarship awards.
|
|
|
|
YAP serves over 19,000 families a year in more than 100 programs across 22 states and the District of Columbia in rural, suburban and urban areas.
|
|
|
Strengthening Systems to Better Serve Youth and Families
|
Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. has developed a framework to guide policies and practices to ensure that it is providing a safe, inclusive and respectful environment for LGBTQ+ young people as well as their families and YAP staff. As part of YAP’s commitment to better serving all youth and families, intake forms will include self-identifying data related to sexual orientation, gender identify and expression. YAP’s focus is strengthening services to promote better outcomes. The new policies were informed by practices and resource information from The Human Rights Campaign; the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Youth in the Juvenile Justice System;” and the National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) and Impact Justice’s “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Questioning, and/or Gender Nonconforming and Transgender Girls and Boys in the California Juvenile Justice System: A Practice Guide,” by Angela Irvine and Aisha Canfield at Impact Justice and Shannan Wilber at NCLR.
|
|
|
|
YAP Employees Launch #YAPGivingTuesday to Raise Fund to Support Youth and Families in their Communities
|
Launching #YAPGivingTuesday, YAP employees raised more than $6,820 to support youth and families in their communities. For more than four decades, Youth Advocate Programs (YAP) Inc. employees have been focused on delivering programs that have proven to be an effective and safe alternative to youth prison, residential behavioral health facilities and other out-of-home placements. The Nov. 27, #YAPGivingTuesday campaign resulted in a 300 percent increase in day-to-day traffic to YAP’s donate page, helping employees raise public awareness of their mission and giving the public a simple way to support their cause. YAP employees shared social media memes and messages highlighting youth and others they serve through their community-based residential placement alternatives. YAP Advocates -- employees who live in the neighborhoods of individuals and families they serve -- provide intensive one-to-one mentoring while working with their teammates to empower parents/guardians with individualized toolkits and connections to resources to help them succeed. To learn more about YAP’s programs and to make a donation, please go to
yapinc.org.
|
|
|
|
Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. Fall 2018 Snapshots
|
|
LEBANON COUNTY, PA
Lebanon County Youth Advocate Programs and Lebanon Valley College (LVC) partnered for Be Kind, a senior seminar project that enabled YAP youth to help develop and implement ways to spread kindness in the community. This is the fourth year YAP has partnered with LVC Sociology and Criminal Justice Department Chair Sharon Arnold for projects that give students real-world experiences. LVC students and YAP staff and youth met weekly to explore what it means to Be Kind and how an act of kindness can make others feel. The project culminated in a gala where teams introduced their completed projects to YAP youths’ parents and community leaders and shared how their kindness can live beyond the project.
|
|
PROVIDENCE RI
Rhode Island YAP recently celebrated one and a half years of service. Partner agencies joined YAP employees, youth and families at a special open house event which featured transition-age young people served by the program. Among the guests was Associate Director of Contracts and Compliance, DCYF – Rhode Island Department of Children Youth and Families Deb Buffi.
|
|
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Youth Advocate Programs Chief of Policy and Advocacy Shaena Fazal joined other national advocates at Grantmakers in Health’s Fall Forum to share what they know works to prevent youth violence. Fazal presented in a session on Opportunities to Invest in Community-Based Solutions at Hope and Healing: A Public Health Approach to Youth Violence Prevention.
|
|
BALTIMORE
Nearly 200 people came out Sat., Aug. 25, for the Baltimore Youth Advocate Programs (YAP) Inc. annual Resource Fair. Among them was Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh, who welcomed and mingled with guests from the Cumberland and Carey Park neighborhood. Baltimore YAP hosts the event just before the start of the school year to let families know about community resources available to them in their neighborhood.
|
|
LANCASTER, PA
At a recent gathering in his honor at Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. in Lancaster, Pa, Kevin Gamber shared his personal story to let a group of young people know that like them, he’d made decisions in the past that were sending him down a very different path. Gamber is a 2018 YAP Tom Jeffers Endowment Fund for Continuing education scholarship recipient.
|
|
Follow YAP on social media
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|