[Youth-outreach] Youth Outreach Efforts

[Thorpe, Mary Jo]

Dear Coordinators: 
 
    During the last two years or so the NFB has seen a huge increase in
the youth outreach efforts of our organization.  Many of you have been
involved or directly responsible for this activity.  The variety of
programs is vast with each program having its own style and design.
This is very exciting and we hope to see more activity like this.  Those
of us who work in youth outreach efforts at the Jernigan Institute are
aware of many of these programs, but recognize that there may be some we
do not know of yet.  In an effort to continue unifying  all the youth
outreach efforts of the NFB across the country, and to learn more about
new programs, we are soliciting some information from you.  
 
    We would like to compile a working list of all the programs
different affiliates may have in regards to working with youth.  This
list along with supportive information on the programs will then be made
available through the NFB Jernigan Institute website and updated on an
on-going basis.  This refers to such outreach efforts as transition
clubs, Jr. NFB chapters, after school programs, teen groups, summer
programs, etc. which your state has for youth  including school age
through high school students.  
 
    Our goal is that this will help these programs to collaborate with
each other, as well as provide ideas for state affiliates who may be
looking to begin their own program.  This will also help us at the
Institute to keep up on the activity in this area and see where we might
be able to offer assistance or useful resources. 
 
    I would appreciate it if those of you working with youth programs
for your state would email me the following information:
*Name of program 
*State 
*Age it serves 
*Person in-charge 
Some way to contact the person in charge of this program (phone or email
address) 
*Brief explanation about the program (I.e. is this an after school
program, transition club, Jr. NFB chapter, Braille club, mentoring
group, etc.) 
*Links to any online sites related to this program (I.e. affiliate web
pages dedicated to youth group, face book groups, my space pages, etc.) 
 
For example:
Transition to Independence Club 

Maryland 

Teens ages 14-18 

Mary Jo Thorpe 

This group meets once a month and works on blindness skills and
transition goals such as job readiness and college prep.  Most of our
participants come from the Greater Baltimore area.  

www.nfb.org/transition_club.asp <http://www.nfb.org/transition_club.asp>


 

    I hope that those of you who have established these kinds of
programs will take a minute to send me this information.  Again, the
hope is that this will help all of us continue the work to expand our
youth outreach efforts for our organization.  Thank you.  

 

Sincerely,

Mary Jo Thorpe

 

P.S.  My apologies for those of you who  received this message more than
once.  There are some individuals on multiple listservs.

 

Mary Jo Thorpe, MEd, NOMC

Education Program Specialist 

Jernigan Institute 
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND 
1800 Johnson St.
Baltimore, MD 21230
Phone: (410)659-9314 ext. 2407
Email: MTHORPE at nfb.org <mailto:MTHORPE at nfb.org>  
Visit www.nfb.org <http://www.nfb.org/>   
 
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