Youth Context & Need

A staggering proportion of young people are being raised in very low income environments that often present life circumstances that youth are ill equipped to handle and are provide with very limited opportunities for advancement. These youth are too often drawn into lives of gang violence, drugs, and welfare - without exposure to alternative paths, these are the avenues that lead most youth deeper into the poverty cycle. In many low-income communities, the escalating levels of violence, drugs, STDs, and mental illness are a direct result of the absence of constructive opportunities to engage the youth in these neighborhoods.

These young people face serious barriers to employment and advancement due to their socioeconomic status, age, work inexperience, and lack of educational support. Given the nature of the challenges they are perceived to bring in to the workplace, very few mainstream employers are willing to take the risk of hiring teens from low-income backgrounds. Not surprisingly, research has shown that those experiencing unemployment at an early age have annually lower earnings and an increased likelihood of unemployment ahead of them. Even when youth from low-income backgrounds successfully complete high school, our educational system leaves most severely unprepared for a transition to college and career pathways. Less than half of the youth from low-income backgrounds enroll in post-secondary education,, and fewer than 15% ever obtain a college degree.