Phat Summer 2005

Phat Summer, a highly successful collaboration between the Minneapolis Park & Recreation Board, the Minneapolis Public Schools Community Education Department and the Youth Coordinating Board is in its 11th year. Phat Summer is an evening, extended hours recreation program for youth ages 12-18 and was offered at 23 sites in 2005. Funding for Phat Summer was provided by Hennepin County, the NorthWay Community Trust and Local Collaborative Time Study Funds through the Minneapolis Redesign.

Phat Splash
The conclusion of the 11th year of Phat Summer will be marked at a celebration at Jim Lupient Water Park at 1520 Johnson Street NE on Tuesday, August 9 from 7:30-10:00 PM. Phat Splash will feature a barbeque and games, some brief remarks from local officials and of course, swimming in the pool. Last year, Phat Splash was a highly successful event. We look forward to another successful Phat Splash marking the end of a safe, fun summer for Phat Summer program participants. Funding for Phat Splash was provided by Jim Lupient.

Program Observation
This summer the YCB has had the opportunity to work on a Phat Summer observation project with three Step Up student interns. As a part of their work experience these young people have developed a structured observation form and have visited many of the Phat summer sites in order to include their observations as a part of the neighborhood mapping project. Because Phat Summer is such an integral part of summer for so many young people in Minneapolis, we thought it would be a great opportunity for youth to make observations and provide their insights as to how Phat Summer can continue to be a vital, neighborhood based summer option for youth in Minneapolis.

By the end of the summer, we anticipate that 13 of the 23 Phat summer sites will be visited by our Step Up student interns. We believe that having young people – the Step Up students – conduct the observation of and provide their insights on a program geared to young people will help us to ensure Phat Summer’s vitality and history of success as we move into the second decade of the program.

Youth Resource Mapping PHASE II

It was clear from the voices of young people at the Youth Town Hall Forum that young people in Minneapolis want to make a difference in their neighborhoods. As the next step to the Youth Resource Mapping Project, the Youth Coordinating Board is making available up to $4,000 to each neighborhood/neighborhood cluster that finished mapping the resources in their neighborhood. The purpose of the funding is to engage young people in developing and implementing a plan to address one of the areas of concern they identified during the mapping. We hope that many of the neighborhood organizations who worked with the youth will continue this great work so that young people can contribute to making their neighborhood a better place for children and youth. Eligible neighborhood groups can contact Jan Fondell at 612-673-5527 for application materials.

Step Up Interns at the YCB

This summer the YCB has been fortunate to be the work place for two Step-Up student interns, Samantha Esguerra and Nichole Wesley.

Samantha Esguerra is a Step-Up intern working as a Youth Development Assistant for the YCB. She has been touring and observing Phat Summer sites in a continuation of the resource mapping project. For fun, Sam likes to see local artists in concert and go for bike rides around the lakes with her friends. Sam has been attending South High but is transferring to Avalon Charter School for her Junior year. She loves her internship and hopes to work with Step-Up again next summer.

Nichole Wesley is a Step-Up intern working at the YCB as an Assistant to the Director. She is working on creating a resource directory of foundations, and also touring and observing Phat Summer sites. Outside of work Nichole volunteers with a program called the HAS (HIV/AIDS/STD) Awareness program. Nichole attends Washburn High School where she is entering her senior year.

Having both Step-Up Interns as part of our team this year has been a great experience for the staff at the YCB. Their contributions to our work have been outstanding.

Allies for Change Project 2005-06

Each year, the YCB, through the Minneapolis Redesign, has the opportunity to apply for funding from the Alliance for Families and Children in Hennepin County through a grant process called Allies for Change. These are non-competitive grants to individual collaboratives to fund pilot projects and enhance services in two areas: Kid’s Stability and Parent Involvement.

For 2005-06, the funds will be used for projects serving homeless and highly mobile students in Minneapolis. YCB Staff worked with Minneapolis Public Schools staff to design the projects this year. These projects are partnerships that will combine resources of MPS Health Related Services, MPS Student Placement Office, MPS Homeless and Highly Mobile Services, and Hennepin County’s 348-TOTS program. Under the Kid’s Stability Project, Minneapolis Public School staff will hold registration events at two homeless shelters. Activities will include school choice information and placement at schools, registration, release of information form, immunizations, early childhood and preschool screening, school supply distribution and the Information Station resource center. Under the Parent Involvement Project, MPS will provide preschool screening in at least two shelters one morning each week for six weeks. MPS will also incorporate Information Station resources and family literacy activities into the screening process. The goal is to make the screening process more accessible and friendly to parents of homeless and highly mobile students, and to build relationships that will encourage them to be involved with their child’s education.