Essex County, NJ – Youth Advocate Programs (YAP®), Inc. New Jersey Lead Director Curtis Moore is a former program participant turned employee.
“I am not just the director; I was also a participant,” Moore said. “There were a lot of things I did that I could have done differently when I was growing up.”
One of seven children, Moore was 12 years-old when he started getting into trouble following his parent’s divorce and after his father returned to live in Louisiana where the family is originally from. He was involved in gangs, drug dealing, stealing cars, and in-and-out of residential homes and the youth justice system. Moore was referred to YAP® in 1997.
“He had a rough teenage road,” said Michael Thomas, who was a corrections officer at the youth detention facility where Moore was located. “He had a great sense of leadership, and he always knew what was happening around him. He was an influencer.”
Moore was in the YAP® Essex County Youth Justice Program for three months, but at age 19 he was sent to prison for manslaughter and served 13 years.
“I didn’t see myself doing anything or living past 18 or 19,” Moore said. “Seven days before my 19th birthday, I was facing 30 years for murder. The judge said to me, ‘I don’t see a monster that the state is saying you are.’ I never forgot that Black man in my life who really spoke life into me and said, ‘I see you, I hear you.’”
YAP® is a national nonprofit that partners with youth justice, child welfare, education, mental health, and other public systems to deliver its community-based services as a safer, more-effective alternative to placing youth in trouble or crisis in corrections and residential treatment facilities. YAP® also partners with public safety and school systems to apply principles of its evidence-based individual and family “wraparound services” approach to reduce violence.
YAP® Advocates are trained to deliver wraparound support to program participants and their parents, guardians and other family members. The evidence-based YAPWRAP® services model helps young people see and nurture their strengths and connects them and their families with individualized resources and support.
“My mother said, ‘if this is the lifestyle that you plan on living, you will either be dead or in jail,’” Moore said.
While locked up, Moore was visited by his family and Thomas, who told him that the wrong choices have consequences. In incarceration, Moore received his high school diploma and associate’s degree. After he was released from prison, he earned his bachelor’s degree in social work from New Jersey’s Kean University.
“After he completed his sentence, he came home and was involved in church, and I started mentoring him again,” added Thomas, who is also a YAP Advocate. “He wanted to help kids and do what he could, so he became involved with YAP.”
Moore said he was asked to share his story and was a motivational speaker to YAP® program participants before officially being hired in 2017 as a part-time Advocate. He soon moved up the ladder by becoming a program coordinator, assistant director, program director and lead director over New Jersey’s youth justice and outreach programs.
“My very first participant was a really difficult 17-year-old when I started working with him,” Moore recalled, adding he still keeps in contact with the youth who has since moved to Alabama. “He didn’t want to engage or do anything. This was so long ago, before some of the systems we have in place now. The company was doing intakes on paper then.”
To-date, Moore believes he has assisted approximately 100 youths, including former program participant Mufee who was in the program in 2015.
“Growing up I didn’t really know any better and I was doing what these young guys do nowadays like being in the streets and doing bad things,” Mufee said. “I was put in the YAP program and that is how I met Mr. Moore.”
Mufee and Moore took him places, allowed him to work with his mobile car wash to help him make money, and encouraged him to stay out of the streets.
“Once I turned 18, I was done with all that bad stuff, and I’ve never been to jail a day in my life,” Mufee said. “I actually moved away from New Jersey, and life is actually going good for me.”
Now 25, Mufee has a 3-year-old daughter, has relocated to Pennsylvania and is seeking employment.
“[Moore] really made me the man I am today,” he added. “He’s a very good mentor.”
Moore has written several books on community engagement and his experiences. He has authored “I Am a Survivor,” “Tears of Soldier,” “The Advocate,” “From Pain to Power,” and “FIRE.” Additionally, he serves on the Essex County Gun Violence Advisory Board and has been asked to speak about the effects of gun violence throughout the state of New Jersey.
“I am really happy with how things worked out for [Moore],” said Thomas, who has worked for YAP® for 22 years. “It’s really about these kids; it’s not about us. [Moore] is one of a thousand that I’ve seen who have impacted these kids’ lives and helped them to make a positive change.”
For Moore, his “why” is because he was a former YAP® participant.
“I am an advocate at heart, not just for kids but for community,” Moore added. “YAP is a community-based driven organization that is motivated by boots on the ground’s services. This work is my passion. I love what I do and people see it. There are so many Curtis’s who don’t make it out.”
For more information on YAP, visit yapinc.org.
