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The Youth Development Commission The seeds for the Youth Development Commission (YDC) were planted in 1992 and 1993 through a joint effort of youth services professionals, business people and the residents of St. Joseph County interested in opportunities for the youth of St. Joseph County. The concept of combining resources and creating a synergy among the agencies which provide youth services has since become A Healthy Communities Intiative Council as of October 1999. The YDC has been actively initiating programs to involve youth in the community efforts to promote unity and wellness. Search Institute* has identified 40 factors in young people's lives that make them more likely to grow up healthy, caring, and responsible. Our interactive on-line checklist was created to encourage communication and understanding between adults and teens, as well as to assist in determining the areas where a youth is receiving optimal support for health and growth, and where support may be lacking. A series of after school meetings with area high school and middle school students to discuss issues which impact their environment have been held; and, to date, more than 150 students have participated in dialogues on the role that peer pressure plays in provoking fights between students. The students concluded that incidences of fighting can be reduced if differences are discussed in private rather than being agitated by people who want to provoke a confrontation. Facilitating the discussions were Chris Pochert of the South Bend Community School Corporation and Tom Evons of the HCI Youth Development Commission, assisted by youth advisors, Leta F. Covington, Verge Gilliam, Regina Williams and Eric Collins.
*Search Institute: Healthy Communities • Healthy Youth is a national initiative to bring Search Institute's new paradigm for positive youth development to communities across the country. The initiative, rooted in the institute's framework of developmental assets, provides communities, schools, organizations and families with resources, technical assistance and training to launch and sustain long-term efforts to promote the positive development of youth. |
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"It is the duty of youth to bring its fresh powers to bear on Social progress. Each generation of young people should be to the world like a vast reserve force to a tired army. They should lift the world forward. That is what they are for." Charlotte Perkins Gilman
“Young people do not grow up in programs… They grow up in communities”
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