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It is hard to believe that it has been 10 years since PESA was founded. While the organization has expanded tremendously in the last decade, PESA’s mission of supporting the community’s youth has remained at the core of our efforts.
On April 29, 2013, PESA was officially recognized as a nonprofit organization. PESA was founded by Seymour Amster, Executive Director and Criminal Defense attorney of over 30 years. Amster wanted to create an organization that provides critical support to underserved communities. He shares that as a lawyer, “I felt that I could provide valuable support in the educational system.”
While the initial vision was to secure and provide funding for public school students to visit courtrooms and government entities, PESA soon expanded. Two months after PESA was incorporated, the Los Angeles County Superior Court requested that PESA become the community based organization that supports the largest juvenile diversion program, Teen Court. Around the same time, a group of parents for students with special needs asked PESA for advocacy to secure a better education for their children. To this day, PESA remains involved in Individualized Education Plan (IEP) advocacy for special needs youth and the Teen Court program.
One of Amster’s goals was also to create an organization that fostered peer to peer support, so he recruited recent high school graduates who had served as Teen Court jurors to support the community’s youth. Over the years, duties and responsibilities shifted as new projects, events, programs, and partnership developed. In 2016, seven graduates from Grant High School joined the PESA team part-time. One of the “original 7” as they call themselves, Rosie Avetisyan shares, “I love the work that we do, I love my colleagues and my mentors. It is not just a job for me, but a learning experience, and it is satisfying because we see the results of our work come to fruition. To see the youth improve as a result of our work is truly rewarding.”
After much success in Teen Court and education support, PESA became proactive in initiating the Community Attendance Assistance Panel (CAAP) in 2022 to address the rising chronic absenteeism in schools. Today PESA has over 50 partnerships with schools, colleges and universities, law enforcement agencies, government entities, and many more that allow us to provide exceptional services in our community. These services include mental health support, student workshops, certification programs, and internship opportunities that empower students from diverse backgrounds to become leaders in our community. In recognition of these services, in 2021, PESA is proud to have been awarded the California Nonprofit of the Year by the California State Legislature.
Amster has high hopes for PESA’s future. He believes that,"what we aspired for in the past is now what we have in place." PESA’s future will continue to prioritize supporting and empowering youth to build the futures that they desire and deserve.
If you’d like to support PESA’s many social and educational initiatives, please contact us.
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