Four Youth Honored for Contributions to Their Communities
Innovations in Community Development Youth Awards

(Atlanta, GA) -- NeighborWorks® America announced the first Innovations in Community Development Youth Awards, honoring four young citizens from across the nation who have dedicated their time, energy, and unique talents to improving their communities. The awards will be presented Wednesday, February 22, at the NeighborWorks symposium, “Youth Matters: New Voices Energizing Community Development,” in Atlanta, Georgia.

The awards cover four leadership categories — academic setting, team building and collaborations, policy and advocacy, and environmental efforts and disaster rebuild. The four winners are: Rudolfo Reyes of Houston, Texas; Alex Schneider of Boise, Idaho; Tyler Bacon of Jacksonville, Florida; and Yorri Berry of New Orleans, Louisiana.

“As adult community leaders, we’ve become too accustomed to talking at youth, rather than with them. The four award winners honored this week remind us that youth are taking responsibility for their neighborhoods and making vital community decisions,” said NeighborWorks America southern district director Don Phoenix. “These examples demonstrate that when we give young people the power and the means to express themselves publicly on vital issues that affect them, we not only build confidence and develop youth potential, the entire community benefits from youth contributions.”

Rudolfo Reyes, Houston, Texas
As the student representative on his community’s Sharing Decision Making Committee Rudolfo Reyes — a senior at Jefferson Davis High School in Houston, TX — carries an immense responsibility to both represent youth and advocate for their needs. The Committee includes the principal and a parent from Jefferson Davis High School, a business representative, the police department’s community liaison, and the Northside Weed and Seed liaison.

One of the committee’s newest projects is to establish a juvenile court at the neighborhood library to improve family participation. Parents have not been able to attend downtown court dates, because they work long hours and do not have cars. A court location at the library would make attendance easier.

With Reyes’s input, the Shared Decision Making Committee is able to understand the complex issues facing the neighborhood, to inform youth about community programs and issues, and to have a high rate of student participation in community programs and events.

Alex Schneider, Boise, Idaho
When Alex Schneider — an eighth grader at Riverglen Junior High in Boise, Idaho — realized that homeless families with children in transitional housing did not have computers, he set out to get them.  Working at NeighborWorks organization NHS Inc. of Boise’s Homeward Bound program he saw children at-risk of falling behind without basic computer literacy.  To date, Schneider has obtained 15 computers with current operating systems, and is working with local businesses to get software.

Schneider is also preparing a curriculum to help the kids learn computer skills, and has permission from his teacher to use his school’s computer lab for training. He plans to conduct the classes himself, with supervision, because he feels the kids will learn better from someone their own age.

Schneider is expanding the program to include kids in the NeighborWorks organization’s rental housing communities. Two computers will be placed in each apartment community room, and seven will be given to Homeward Bound families. He plans to encourage his students to teach their computer skills to their parents, too — as a way to help break the cycle of poverty.

Tyler Bacon, Jacksonville, Florida
With firsthand experience in the foster care system, Tyler Bacon of Jacksonville, Florida, has focused on improving the foster care system since he was 17. Serving on several youth and adult boards, Bacon has raised awareness and sparked significant improvements.  For example, after listening to Bacon, Volunteer Jacksonville took on the remodeling of a group home for younger kids who first enter the system. They repainted the walls, and fixed and repainted the playground set. They bought new furniture and put it together. They also did the lawn, and made the home safer and more welcoming. Bacon also sits on a committee that is currently developing a national peer-mentoring program for foster youth.

Bacon was recently voted vice president of the National Foster Youth Advisory Council, which advocates for change and awareness of the system in the United States.

Yorri Berry, New Orleans, Louisiana
Yorri Berry is a hurricane-displaced Loyola University senior attending Spelman College in Atlanta.  She walked into a new city and a new school with top priorities to stay on-track for graduation and continue serving whatever community surrounded her. Berry set out to raise campus awareness about the political, economic, and health issues left in the wake of hurricane destruction. She was voted into the Spelman Student Government Association Advisory Board, where she became the university’s Hurricane Relief Coordinator.

Berry volunteered at the Hosea Williams Foundation and helped forge an alliance of the three schools in the Atlanta University Center to help those affected by the disaster. She spoke to hundreds of students at an Hurricane Awareness forum designed to raise awareness about the needs of hurricane survivors.  Berry’s work also included coordinating a Basket Auction fundraiser, featuring donations from groups campus-wide, to help promote unity and awareness, and an Adopt-a-Family Campaign, as another outlet for student involvement.

Learn more about Youth in Community Development on the NeighborWorks Web site.