youth education

Since our Youth Education Program began in 2001, more than 50,000 students and over 40 schools have participated in this important programming. As the 20222023 school year has come to a close, another 2,100 students have been added to the growing number of youth who have benefited from these skill-building, attitudechanging programs. This year, our three youth educators completed 540 in-class lessons comprised of 67 full 8-lesson programs in classrooms, and 14 independent lessons delivered to high school classes and after school groups.

Each of our 67 lessons include pre-program and post-program analyses. The statistical results were very encouraging and indicate significant progress is being made in the areas of relationship knowledge, empathy levels, self-efficacy skills, self-esteem, feelings of hope and classroom climates and a reduction in stereotypical attitudes. Specifically, we recorded the following:

• Stereotypical Attitudes decreased by 15.2%

• Empathy increased by 7.0%

• Self-Efficacy increased by 7.6%

• Classroom Climate increased by 8.6%

• Self-Esteem increased by 3.6%

• Feelings of hope increased by 8.0%

• Relationship Knowledge increased by 12.1%

Moreover, we are inspired by the feedback our youth are providing about what they learned:

• “Learning about healthy relationships was important because it helped me notice I was in an unhealthy one.”

• “This taught me so much! I learned that I need to surround myself with people who are good for my mental health and to trust my instincts and do things because I want to.”

• “I learned how to be the best version of myself. That starts with not putting myself down inside my own head.”

• “This program has made my life better in so many ways – Thank you.”

• “I now feel like I’m good enough. I have actually taught my family about the things I learned from FTP.”

Thanks to surplus emergency funding, we converted underutilized space below stairwells in our building to three new storage areas. This provided us with muchneeded space for items like cribs, bedding, small appliances and cots that support our emergency shelter operations.