2024 YGPC Team Aims to Bridge Community Gaps
2024 YGPC Team Aims to Bridge Community Gaps
With their SCI Youth Grant Pitch Contest (YGPC) grant award of $1,200, the Intrepid Keystone Club launched their Bridging the Gap Fair on June 8, 2024. The Intrepid Keystone Club is a team of youth leaders at the JLM Boys & Girls Club of Woburn that aims to provide leadership development opportunities for high school teens through academic success, career preparation, and community service.
The Bridging the Gap Fair was designed to connect families to resources, support, and opportunities within their communities. At the community event, the Intrepid Keystone Club hosted a variety of community organizations such as the Mystic Valley NAACP, Woburn Welcomes, and the Network for Social Justice. The vendors introduced themselves to the families who visited their tables. Many guests left each table with an awareness of available community resources and programs. Guests with a handful of fliers were also a common sight!
As families entered the Bridging the Gap Fair, they were kindly greeted by Intrepid Keystone Club members who offered everyone free raffle entry for prizes such as a gift card to a local cafe. Free pizza and salad were also available at the event. The satisfying turnout was made possible by the Intrepid Keystone Club’s diligence and strategy in conducting outreach for their event.
In the Intrepid Keystone Club’s journey of refining their idea and developing their project pitch, the 2024 YGPC team was guided by three volunteer coaches, Shafiq Ssemwogerere, Chester Nielsen, and Andres Cuartas.
About the Youth Grant Pitch Contest
The goal of SCI’s Pitch Contest is to provide youth with the opportunity to decide how to strengthen their community while practicing valuable professional skills such as public speaking, project management, and community organizing. With the guidance and support of multiple professional volunteer coaches, each youth team will develop their project ideas and be in the driver’s seat of positive change. The youth teams also have the opportunity to participate in skill-building workshops related to team collaboration, public speaking, and pitch development.
The 2024 SCI Youth Grant Pitch Contest was supported by Kick It for a Cause, Winning Home, Inc., Gail O’Rourke, founder, Benefact4, Enterprise Bank, the AmeriCorps Agency, Massachusetts Service Alliance, and a Massachusetts state budget line item, thanks to the advocacy of State Senator Cindy Friedman. Major support for SCI Woburn is provided by Cummings Properties.
