Center for Teen Empowerment - Boston, MA | Somerville, MA

YOUTH ORGANIZERS

Each Teen Empowerment site employs 10-12 youth organizers. Many more young people apply for these positions than TE can hire. Applicants go through a careful screening process, which includes a discussion of the principal issues facing their community. The youth organizer group for each site is chosen to reflect a cross section of the youth in that community and to provide opportunity for young people with leadership potential and commitment to creating positive social change.

Selection and Orientation
Youth organizers are selected through an intensive interview process:

extensive recruitment of applicants (75 to 125 apply at each site)
first interview consisting of a two-hour interactive group session (approximately 10 youth in each group) followed by a ten-minute individual interview
second interview, similar to the first, conducted with about one third of the applicants

At each site, TE seeks to hire a group that is gender-balanced and age-balanced, reflects the diversity of the community where they will work, and possesses the leadership potential to exert positive influence on peers in the community.

Youth who may be interested in becoming youth organizers and who live in a community with a TE site should contact the site for information about when the next interview process will take place.

Training
Once selected, youth organizers meet four afternoons per week for 2-3 hours a day. During the first week of the project, they complete a detailed curriculum designed to:

Build group and individual relationships
Identify key issues in the neighborhood
Place identified issues within a larger social context
Develop an action strategy to address the identified issues and place it into a year-long timeline
Begin to organize their first strategic initiative using TE's Ten-Step Planning Process
Complete orientation to TE's Behavior Change System

Projects
Following this training period, the group then works throughout the year to implement their action strategy. For examples of organizing initiatives, read about TE's program sites.

Youth organizers also plan and, with volunteers, produce the annual youth conferences in Boston, Somerville, and Rochester.

All youth organizers sign a contract with TE and receive weekly feedback on their work. (Read about TE's Behavior Change System.) Some youth have commented about this aspect of their jobs:

By working with TE, I have learned a more mature way to communicate with my close peoples.
Groups can become better by constructive criticism.
I learn that if you make a mistake the first time, try very hard so it won't happen again.

Results
Youth organizers gain self-awareness, acquire skills, and receive practical help from staff in TE's programs. In anonymous responses to year-end surveys, some have commented as follows:

They have helped me to see who I really am and that I can do anything.
The staff has given moral support to me when issues come about and advice in order to handle issues.
Helping with a problem, giving advice, making me laugh.
They talk to you if you have any family problems, supported me a lot with good advice.
Help me to deal with homelessness.
I'm using my mediation skills that I received when I have conflicts w/ family, friends, teachers, peers, etc.
TE has opened up closed doors and brought light into a lot of youth organizers. I thank TE in so many ways.

When asked, "Has working with Teen Empowerment changed your attitudes or beliefs in any way? If so, how?" some answered:

Yes, working with TE is actually letting me realize what's really going on in my community [more] than I ever did before.
Working with TE has changed my attitudes, now I take things more seriously, and try to avoid problems more often.
Yes, I have more respect for others around me.
Teen Empowerment has made me believe I can do anything.
Yes, I have changed my outlook on lesbians and gays. I respect them now.
Teen Empowerment has changed my attitude about working with groups and valuing others opinion.

Youth organizers are the voice of Teen Empowerment at all TE events and initiatives. Each year, youth organizers write and deliver hundreds of speeches. Here are some excerpts:

"When I finally got to know the whole thing about Teen Empowerment, I started to come out of my shell and, as you can see, I became a motivated speaker and leader. I've been interviewed by the Boston Globe. I've spoken at hearings and at large community meetings. I've been on the radio and on TV. The bottom line about Teen Empowerment is that it helps improve our schools and communities. It helps youth like myself learn to use our voices and make a positive contribution. I know that we all won't agree on everything, but it really helps when each of us has a chance to be heard." L., a former youth organizer, has since graduated from college.
"Before I helped organize TE's dialogue sessions [between police and youth], I would never have had any kind of relationship with a police officer. ... Through the dialogues, I learned that I can use my leadership to better my own life and the lives of the people around me." C., a youth organizer at the South End / Lower Roxbury site
"Being a Teen Empowerment youth organizer was one of the major building blocks of my life." M., a youth organizer in 1997-98, graduated from college in 2004.
"I enjoy this job because I get a chance to deal with issues that are important to me and get the skills I need to help me reach my future goals. You see, growing up in my neighborhood, there were a lot of different things that were really hard to handle. Living with violence, drugs, hate crimes, and other forms of victimization really got me down. A lot of youth that I know turned in the wrong direction and joined in the negativity that surrounded them. I didn't want to go down that path. I wanted to find a way to deal with these issues and learn what I needed to know to get out of this trap. That's where Teen Empowerment comes in. Teen Empowerment is not your average 'save the youth, give them something to occupy themselves' kind of organization. Yes, it does help youth help themselves, but Teen Empowerment's main goal is to work for positive change in society. It teaches young people how one issue builds on another. So if you deal with the right problems, you can have a big impact on the whole picture. ... Teen Empowerment has had a major impact on me. It opened my eyes to see the many different things that need to be worked on in my school, in my community, and in society. It also helped me face the changes that needed to be made in my life. I've changed my approach to how I handle conflicts, and the way I view people who are different from me. I've learned how to actually listen to other people's opinions even if I disagree with what they are saying. Teen Empowerment trained me in organizing skills, taught me facilitation skills, and helped me build on my talents and discover new ones. Teen Empowerment gives us a chance to express ourselves and gives us the training we need to do it well. ... Basically, we are talking about starting a positive cycle of change." M., who gave this speech when he was a high school junior, has graduated from high school and now works at TE while attending college.