YAP, Inc.The Neighborhood Advocate

Harrisburg, Pa. — Twelve years after getting a job at Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. as a Behavioral Health program therapist, Frida Shu reflects on her journey and sees why her work comes so naturally.

YAP is a national nonprofit in 33 states and the District of Columbia that provides more effective community-based services as an alternative to congregate residential youth justice, child welfare and behavioral health placements. Across the country, cities are also making the YAP model part of their community violence reduction initiatives.

Last year, Frida was on the campus of an elementary school to visit with a program participant and heard someone call her name.

“I heard, ‘Ms. Frida; Ms. Frida.’” The voice sounded familiar. “When I looked up, I couldn’t believe it,” she said. The voice belonged to a young woman in her mid-twenties.

“She was the first person I ever worked with at YAP back in 2011,” Frida said. “At the time, she was battling anxiety and depression. When I saw her and she called me over to her, she was picking up her daughter. I was so happy; I gave her a hug. I’d been wondering about her,” she said. “‘This is my car; I have a boyfriend,’” she remembers the young woman saying as she caught Frida up on how well she was doing.

“I was so happy. I was so proud of her. She was happy, healthy and had a job; and she was behaving!  When I met her, she was probably 16 and so advanced socially. Her grandma would cry to me, saying that she hadn’t seen her for days,” Frida said. “I’d advise this girl on how to control her anger and the moment I’d leave, before I got home, she would have already left the house. It was the same way at school. I’d be there with her for three hours and as soon as I left, she was out the door with boys or smoking.”

These days most of the program participants Frida works with face complex behavioral health struggles as well as developmental disabilities-related challenges. She said 85 percent of the young people that she works with are on the autism spectrum and that given her personal story, it makes sense that her job comes almost second nature.

Born in Cameroon, Frida, her husband and three young children moved to the United States in 1999, among the 50,000 immigrants selected that year through the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program lottery. They lived for several years in Camden, N.J. where her husband’s former college classmate served as a sponsor for the family and helped Frida and her husband establish their lives in the U.S.  In Cameroon, Frida had worked as a lab technician and her husband had a government position in the Department of Agriculture.

“My first job [in the U.S.] was with home healthcare, working with people with autism and my husband was doing online studies in London,” she said. “After three years, I went to Rutgers University and got my B.A. in healthcare management. My husband got his degree in agriculture and got a job in Pennsylvania working for the Department of Agriculture and now works for FEMA.”

After relocating to Pennsylvania, Frida applied her experience and degree in a new job as a human services specialist, again, working with people with autism, mostly adults. At the same time, she continued her studies, earning a master’s in mental health. Then in 2011, she learned about YAP and its focus on delivering strength-based individualized services that that keep young people safely home in their communities and with their families, as an alternative to placements in congregate care in facilities and correctional institutions.

“I’ve worked with young people who are on every part of the autism spectrum. The biggest challenge is getting them to feel comfortable with communicating freely and to feel confidence in what they do,” she said. “I like it. In a way, I can place myself in their shoes. We’re all human beings. We all have our own thinking; our own value.”

In her work with YAP over the years, Frida is often reminded of her first years in the U.S. While thrilled to be in a country that offers so many opportunities, she found adjusting did not come without challenges.

“I arrived in February. It was cold and getting to adapt to the system wasn’t easy. Things are so different; so organized. It was a lot to learn quickly coming with children ages 9, 7 and 3 years old,” she said. “Daycare, picking them up from school – a lot. Back home, I had a nanny in the house. But we couldn’t afford that here. Yes, a lot of challenges. In time we arranged our schedules and made other adjustments and we got used to it.”

Frida recalls working with a young YAP program participant and his family who immigrated from Mexico and understanding how much her personal background prepared her for her work with them.

“The experience I had; and what I went through; it helps me. I watched what the parents had been through; how for them to be able to handle their job and take care of a child with mental challenges and facing the system — they were dealing with all of that,” she said.

Frida remembers the worry the 7-year-old boy’s parents felt when they came close to losing him to foster care. “The child was acting out during a time that he was with an older child, and they were both at work. They were reported twice and they were so scared,” she said. “I shared my challenges that I experienced when we first came to the U.S. I gave them the idea for how to fix their schedules so that one of them is at home and the other person is at work.”

Frida was proud to be a part of supporting the family and sees the importance of cultural responsiveness, one of YAP’s core competencies, in her work. She also is aware that there is still a stigma attached to mental health needs and feels honored to be a part of YAP’s work to change that.

See job openings and learn more about YAP at www.YAPInc.org and follow the nonprofit on Twitter @YAPInc.

Hope, Arkansas – Staff at Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. in South Arkansas describe Rainy as one of the hardest working women they know.

“(Rainy) has dedicated her life to making the lives of her family better by working multiple jobs with little rest,” said Lisa Clark, YAP Family Intervention Specialist. “She is determined that if one way doesn’t work, to not stop until she has found another way.”

YAP is a national nonprofit in 33 states and the District of Columbia that partners with youth justice, child welfare, behavioral health, and other systems to provide trauma-informed community-based services as an alternative to youth incarceration, congregate placements, residential treatment, and neighborhood violence.

“We are benefitting from (YAP) in so many ways,” said Rainy whose child was a program participant of YAP.  It was a lot that I didn’t know about (my child) that I am finding out. (My child) has started opening up to me so that wall that she had up, I feel it is coming down now. We are starting to interact with one another better. The family is learning to communicate better and to listen to one another more.”

Rainy, a 35-year-old mother of four, is one of 28 YAP program participants and family members or guardians who received a scholarship from the 2022 Tom Jeffers Endowment Fund for Continuing Education. Currently, Rainy works long hours in a factory job which keeps her away from home for long periods of time.

“On average I work anywhere from 45-70 hours a week,” Rainy said. “My work schedule prevents me from being able to spend time with my children or to interact with them after getting off work because I am so tired.”

The $1,000 scholarship will allow Rainy to return to school, earn a phlebotomy certificate and obtain better employment that will allow her to be home more with her children. YAP scholarships are applied to school tuition, fees or supplies, job training costs, or in the form of a laptop computer.

“We are so proud of Rainy and the progress she is making to ensure her family has a successful and sustainable future,” added Heidi Calhoun, YAP South Arkansas Program and Clinical Director.

Rainy thanks YAP for its help and hopes to help other families who are in similar situations.

“It will help me in so many ways,” she said. “One, I will be able to get a good paying job and not have to keep doing factory work, that takes me away from my kids for long hours. It will also help me with establishing a regular schedule with my family, where I did not have that before.”

YAP’s program in South Arkansas includes Hempstead, Miller, Nevada, Little River, Columbia, Ouachita, Union, Sevier, and LaFayette counties.

To learn more about YAP, visit yapinc.org. You can follow YAP on Twitter @YAPInc.

Elizabethtown, Ky. – Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc., Regional Director Jamaal Crawford served as the guest speaker at Hardin County’s National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) 32^nd Dr. Martin Luther King/Lottie O. Robinson Scholarship Fundraiser Luncheon, on Jan. 16. This year’s theme was “Remember the Dream.”

“YAP is excited to work collaboratively with other partners who want our youth to be successful in their homes,” Crawford said. “Our goal is to provide these kids with as many resources as possible to be successful in these communities. Once our communities buy into wrapping around youth and families, it can only set our kids up to elevate in life.”

YAP is a national nonprofit that provides community-based services in 33 states and the District of Columbia as an alternative to youth incarceration, congregate residential care, and neighborhood violence.

Crawford, who oversees Kentucky, Indiana and Ohio, was proud to address attendees in honor of King who was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968.

For more information about YAP, visit yapinc.org.

Towanda, Penn. – Gaining employment experience is essential for young people and particularly invaluable to individuals who have disabilities.

Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. Bradford County connects high school students and adults who have disabilities or face other employment barriers to on-the-job training opportunities. The program — a partnership with the Pennsylvania Office of Vocational Rehabilitation (OVR) – would not be possible without the support of Bradford and Sullivan County businesses.

“I am retired but returned to the workforce because I believe in YAP’s mission of helping youth and their families. My YAP experience has been very rewarding. I love giving back to the community, and I am grateful that local businesses stepped up to assist us in our work,” said YAP Bradford/Sullivan County Employment Specialist Rachelle “Rocky” Thibault-Finan.

YAP is a national nonprofit in 33 states and Washington, D.C. YAP works to keep young people safely home and out of congregate residential care and youth incarceration by providing community-based services as an alternative to child welfare, behavioral health, and intellectual disabilities placements. Headquartered in Harrisburg, YAP is a 47-year-old organization serving 150 communities including Bradford and Sullivan counties.

This holiday season, YAP would like to recognize all Bradford and Sullivan County businesses that have opened their doors to allow our program participants to get real world work experience, which includes:

• Pam’s Restaurant
• Hurley’s Supermarkets – Dushore and Towanda
• Sinclair’s Hardware
• Rainbow Riders
• Bradford County Humane Society
• Nana’s Country Kitchen
• Beeman’s Restaurant
• Animal Care Sanctuary
• Athens Public Library
• Riverside Cemetery Association
• Child Hunger Outreach Partnership of Towanda
• Happy Tails Animal Shelter
• Comfort Inn Sayre

“For 30 years I have been blessed to live in this close-knit community that is kind, welcoming and open to lending a hand to help our young people.” said Thibault-Finan.

If your business would like to be involved, please call the office at (570) 268-5777. For more information about YAP, visit yapinc.org. Follow the nonprofit @YAPInc.

Tampa, Fla. — This month, members of Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. Board of Directors got some up-close-and-personal reminders of why they volunteered to serve the national nonprofit. While in Tampa for a quarterly meeting, the board members met program leaders, partners, and individual benefitting from YAP’s community-based services.

At a dinner the evening before their quarterly meeting, Pinellas Pasco Program Director Heidi Molina introduced Quay, 18, a former YAP Youth Justice Program participant. He talked about facing complex challenges since the age of two when after his sister went to school with burns from touching an iron on the stove; the siblings were separated from their mother.

YAP is a national nonprofit it 34 states and Washington, DC. that partners with youth justice, child welfare, behavioral health, education, public safety, and other systems to deliver community-based services as a more effective alternative to youth incarceration, congregate residential treatment, and neighborhood violence.

Quay spoke about being in the child welfare system, placed with his grandmother for a short time and later with his father when he returned briefly from prison before another incarceration. After his grandmother’s death, he went to live with an aunt in South St. Petersburg, where at age 13, he committed an offense that landed him on probation.

“I was a kid; I didn’t know what to do. I was just trying to feed my family. We were going through it. We were struggling,” he said.

Quay said that the rules of his probation required that he be in the house at 6 p.m., and that he probation violated over and over because the restriction made playing outside with his friends and just having fun and being a kid impossible. He said he dropped out of school in ninth grade as his way of having time outdoors with his friends. Quay said his life changed when a judge moved his curfew to 11 p.m. and enrolled him in YAP.

“When I was 17, she introduced me to the YAP program; she’s the reason why I stopped violating because I had a talk with her, and she changed my curfew to 11,” Quay said.

Quay said being a part of the program helped him see his strengths and opened his eyes to new possibilities.

“I’d never been out of my neighborhood; so the first time I went to the beach was with them [his YAP Advocates]; and my first time doing any kind of critical activity like yoga, easing my mind; getting my mind off other stuff, I did that with the YAP program,” Quay added.

Board members also visited the Tampa YAP office where Program Director Felicia Wells and YAP Advocate Ishmell McKitchen briefed them on Stop Now And Plan or SNAP® and other community-based services they deliver to keep young people who might be at risk for youth justice system involvement on a positive path. The Tampa office administers SNAP® and other preventative programs as part of its partnership with the Florida Network of Youth and Family Services, which describes SNAP® on its website as a “front-end” resource to the Department of Juvenile Justice Office of Prevention, for at-risk youth ages 6-11 and their families.

Patricia Smith, a grandmother of a program participant, expressed her gratitude to YAP Advocate McKitchen for empowering her grandson with tools to focus on positivity.  “He still uses the principles of SNAP. It impacts his life; it helped us to be able to engage more.” She added that at times, her grandson even reminds her to employ the SNAP principles.

Following the office visit, the YAP board members visited a Tampa apartment complex where many of the Hillsborough County program participants live. The complex manager shared his appreciation for YAP and talked about many of the challenges faced by parents and children YAP serves.

YAP Southeast Regional Vice President LaVeisha Cummings, who arranged the visit and dinner program, also introduced Board members to Orange, Osceola, Seminole County team leaders — Program Director Seyny Dressler, Assistant Program Director Richard McFarland and Clinical Director Carmen Ziers.

Ziers shared details of YAP’s Behavioral Health services and Dressler and McFarland talked about services they deliver through a partnership with Embrace Families.

They provided an overview on their youth justice prevention and diversion, wraparound mentoring services, and a new Rapid Response program to support youth returning home from placement and their families.

Additionally, board members learned about other successful Pinellas Pasco YAP Youth Justice Program participants from Program Coordinator Ophilia Ciesicki.

Ending the briefings were inspirational closing remarks at the dinner from Quay.

“I actually love the YAP program and I just want to thank everybody for treating me like family, and hopefully one of these days, I’ll be a YAPper.”

Learn more about YAP at yapinc.org and follow the organization on Twitter @YAPInc.

Galax, Va. – Sixteen year-old Kayleen credits her parents and Twin Counties Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. in Virginia with helping her become a more well-rounded person.

Kayleen had been living with Chris and Brandy Waller for a year before the couple adopted her in May 2022. The Waller’s have two biological children and have fostered 10 young people in the past two years after they saw a need to help youth in their community. Kayleen and one of the other children they fostered received support from YAP Advocates after the couple learned about the program from their social worker.

YAP, a national nonprofit in 33 states and Washington, D.C., partners with youth justice, child welfare, behavioral health, and other systems to provide community-based services as a more effective alternative to youth incarceration and congregate residential placements. In recent years, YAP has also applied its Advocate model to provide services to help communities reduce neighborhood violence.

“I had never heard of YAP until I started fostering,” Brandy Waller said. “We were just very thankful that there was this program that could come in and take our foster children out for an hour to three hours a day to give them that quality time that we might not have been able to do. It helps them curb their anxiety and helps having someone there that just solely focused on them.”

YAP hires neighborhood-based Advocates who are trained to empower program participants to see their strengths while connecting them and their families to wraparound services that include educational, economic, and emotional tools to put their lives on a positive path and firm their foundation.

Through her social worker, Kayleen was paired with her YAP Advocate, Avery, who supported her and the couple that would adopt her. YAP’s main objective is to keep youth safely home. YAP Advocates are trained to provide services to program participants, their parents and families, and in cases where children are in foster care, their guardians, too.

“Our social worker will request a YAP Advocate if they feel like it’s needed,” said Waller who is a church children’s ministry director. “When our children did go with their Advocates their attitudes always improved. They could be having a bad day when they get home from school and then go with their Advocate and they come back and it would be like they reset.”

Waller added, “YAP is definitely a blessing. When I felt like I couldn’t give everyone that one-and-one time, YAP was there to help pick up where I couldn’t do everything.”

“My Advocate helped me not feel so stressful,” Kayleen, who is in the tenth grade, said. “We talk about things that I feel like talking about.”

Kayleen says she and Avery volunteered at an animal hospital, have been out to eat, took a trapeze class and to the pool. She is doing well in school, having earned A’s and one C in math, and is already making improvements to bring that grade up.

“We also went to this one bakery place and it was pretty cool,” Kayleen said. “I just like hanging out with her a lot.”

The Waller’s are thankful for the Advocates who have worked with their family, and for Emily Higgins, the Program Director of YAP Twin Counties, Va., whom Brandy says is “wonderful.”

Higgins says working with Kayleen and her adoptive family have been a “joy.”

“It was a privilege to see Kayleen flourish into an exceptional young lady by overcoming many challenges at a young age,” Higgins said. “She now uses her experiences to help support others in similar situations as they learn to overcome them. We are truly proud of Kayleen and the impact that she has made on all of us at YAP, and in the community, through her resilient, gentle spirit.”

YAP provides many individualized services, Higgins says, with the organization’s sole mission to impact youth and families by offering positive support like they’ve been able to do for the Waller’s.

“Teenagers need someone to just listen and as parents we don’t always want to listen; we want to lecture,” Waller added. “These YAP Advocates they listen, they don’t lecture like a parent would do. They’re very patient with people. I would recommend every teenager in the foster care system have an Advocate because they are hard, but they are so worth it. If you have that support system it makes things so much better.”

Kayleen is happy to be living with the Waller’s where she feels safe and loved, something she said she did not receive in other placements.

“I’ve really liked being here,” she said. “My other homes and placements weren’t the best. When I first came here I felt welcomed.”

Learn more about YAP by visiting yapinc.org. Follow the nonprofit on Twitter @YAPInc.

Tampa, Fla. — In an emotional moment, Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. Board Chair and Georgia State Rep. Teddy Reese thanked Jay Snyder for his service and his friendship. Sharing personal stories of their time working together, Reese announced that Snyder will be completing his term after 20 years of service as a YAP Board member. The announcement came during a dinner in Tampa, Fla., where the YAP Board of Directors held its quarterly meeting this month.

YAP is a national nonprofit in 34 states and Washington, D.C. that partners with youth justice, child welfare, behavioral health, and other systems to provide community-based alternatives to youth incarceration and congregate residential placements. In recent years, YAP has also implemented public safety initiatives in partnership with local governments to help curb neighborhood violence.

Snyder began his YAP board service in 2003. A U.S. Army Vietnam War veteran, he had a 20-year career in Pennsylvania state government, that included positions with the Governor’s office, Department of Community Affairs, Pennsylvania House of Representatives, and the Department of Welfare. He also served as Pennsylvania Commissioner for the Blind, President of the National Council of State Agencies for the Blind, Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Office of Vocational Rehabilitation, and President of the National Council of State Agencies of Vocational Rehabilitation.

Snyder is perhaps best known for his work as an umpire at the U.S. Open, Australian Open, French Open and Wimbledon. He also served as the United States Tennis Association Director of Officials, Chief Umpire for the U.S. Open Championships and Director of the U.S. Open.

In 2017, Snyder lost the love of his life, Jeanne, who was his pen pal when he was in Vietnam and became his girlfriend when he came home. Her death came two weeks after the couple celebrated their golden wedding anniversary aboard the Pride of the Susquehanna.

Learn more about YAP at yapinc.org and follow the organization on Twitter @YAPInc.

Thanks to two enthusiastic young people – one from Haiti, the other from Romania – more global leaders will be introduced to effective community-based alternatives to youth incarceration and congregate residential care.

Alexandra Gheorghica and Michael Aristil are wrapping up 12-week Community Engagement Exchange (CEE) Program fellowships with Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. YAP is a U.S.-based national nonprofit in 33 states and the District of Columbia that delivers community-based services as an alternative to youth justice, child welfare and behavioral health congregate residential care, and neighborhood violence.

The CEE program is implemented by IREX in partnership with the Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. YAP Director of International Development Diana Matteson, who oversees the YAP fellowship program, acknowledged the nonprofit’s New Brunswick Program Director Rebecca Escobar and Los Angeles Program Director Brandon Lamar for serving as onsite hosts for the two fellows.

“It was always my dream to participate in an exchange program, to be exposed to the resources, skills and leadership potential,” said New Brunswick-based fellow Michael, who was raised in Haiti by his single mother until her death in 2018. “I started applying for exchange programs for years and I had failed in my attempts. By persevering and continuing to prepare myself I finally got this opportunity.”

As part of his fellowship, working alongside YAP staffer Patricia Louis, Michael came to understand how the YAP wraparound services model works to help young people and their families see and nurture their strengths to make positive life changes.

Alexandra, who came to the U.S. from Romania, has been spending her time working with YAP’s Los Angeles-based youth justice Advocate team. In her home country, she focuses on youth participation and empowerment in her work with the Active Development Association and as part of the European Youth Village Programme, which offers youth in rural areas tools to bring change, strategically address local issues, and create new opportunities for other young people.

“During my work in the States, I observed similarities in the challenges American and especially the Black and Hispanic youth and youth with fewer opportunities face,” she said, adding that they are “often subjects of systematic discrimination, stereotypes, and not being considered a relevant voice in their communities.”

CEE is supported by U.S. tax dollars to promote global civic engagement and provide meaningful connections so that fellows’ home communities can benefit from global collaboration.

Michael hopes to introduce aspects of YAP’s youth and family wraparound services model to support students he works for the Heliotrope Foundation as part of afterschool tutoring programs in Haiti.

“In the afterschool program, we provide the kids with the opportunity to come, learn, and play in a fun and caring environment — psychosocial activities, creative games, art, cooking lessons etc.,” he said. “The tutoring program on the other hand is designed to help the elementary school students with homework and provide them with weekly classes to help them in the subjects they are having difficulty with — Haitian history and culture, French, Haitian creole, math, reading etc. — especially because political instability and violence constantly paralyzes the functioning of school there,” he added. For example, Michael explained how school was supposed to be resumed in Haiti since September 5th, but due to the conditions up until now they are closed.

“Part of the insights from YAP I’m looking ahead to incorporate in the programs I run are to better focus and assess the interests, strengths, and areas in which the kids need improvements and work in closer collaboration with their parents to help the kids set goals and work towards achieving them,” he said. “Working with kids on a large group setting was good in some ways, but I have learned an important perspective that’s worth trying.”

Alexandra recently completed university studies and will continue full-time with the Romania Active Development Organization. The opportunity will enable her to train a network of leaders in disadvantaged communities who can strengthen their communities with new tools.

Alexandra said she plans to bring the energy and motivation from her experience in the States to in the rural communities in her home country.

“I am looking forward to returning and continuing to develop myself as a mentor who can train youth workers in their own villages to bring opportunities to support their communities, apply for their own funding, and work with authorities” she added.

Michael is not certain how he will share his YAP knowledge when he returns to Haiti. But he is hopeful, as he has been for years, starting each day with his morning ritual of listening to Mariah Carey singing, When You Believe.

“Not only should we raise the hope of the kids, I also believe we should create more places where youth throughout the country can find the support they need to realize their potential and to help them advocate for themselves,” he said.

Learn more about YAP at www.YAPInc.org and follow the nonprofit on Twitter @YAPInc.

Research for this (book, article, video, etc.) was supported in part by the Community Engagement Exchange Program, a program of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) of the United States Department of State, implemented by IREX. The views expressed are the author’s own and do not represent the Community Engagement Exchange Program, the U.S. Department of State, or IREX.

Washington, D.C. –The National Violence Prevention and Community Safety Team of Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. met with graduate students from Donau Universität in Vienna at the Austrian Embassy in the nation’s Capitol to discuss safety, policy, advocacy and systems change.

YAP is a national nonprofit in 33 states and Washington, D.C., that partners with youth justice, child welfare, behavioral health, and other systems to provide community-based alternatives to youth incarceration and congregate residential placements. YAP also partners with public safety systems to combine the nonprofit’s unique wraparound services approach with other evidence-based models to reduce violence.

Delegates included government, private sector, non-governmental organizations, academia, and one Ukrainian citizen.

National Director of Violence Prevention Fred Fogg shared with the delegation how YAP is working to interrupt violence in cities nationally including in the Carolinas, Texas, Maryland, Illinois and New Jersey, among others.

The meeting was set up by YAP’s Director of International Development Diana Matteson with support from Charles Bentil, recruitment specialist and program coordinator for one of YAP’s violence prevention programs. The programs hire and train formerly incarcerated individuals to serve as credible messengers to support other justice-involved individuals and others who are at the highest risk for engaging in violence.

“YAP’s commitment to community safety programming and system change was well-represented by the local team and National Director Fred Fogg at the Embassy of Austria in Washington D.C., in an exchange with a delegation of government and private sectors leaders from Vienna, Austria,” Matteson said. “Academics who had studied causes of high rates of community violence in the U.S. and challenges faced by returning citizens leaving incarceration left the exchange with unique insights on how innovative programming and system change work are being done every day by YAP to address them.”

To learn more about YAP visit yapinc.org and follow the nonprofit on Twitter @YAPInc.

Charlotte, N.C. – Some moms of Mecklenburg County Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. program participants showed up for a relaxing evening  — painting,  sipping cider, and enjoying a pre-Thanksgiving meal.

Hosted by Mecklenburg County YAP’s Youth Justice program, Paint and Chill, was sponsored by LISC Charlotte, a community development organization making economic equality a reality for all Charlotteans.

YAP is a 47-year old non-profit that is located in 33 states and the District of Columbia that provides community-based services as a more effective alternative to youth incarceration and congregate residential care.  The Youth Justice program is a partnership with the court system, which refers participants to YAP. Each young person is assigned a neighborhood-based YAP Advocate who champions for them and their families, guiding them to achieve positive outcomes.

“My son was having some trouble in school and outside of school,” said Q Henderson, whose 15 year-old son is in the youth justice program. “I was directed to YAP to help him make some better decisions. He’s a lot better than when he started out. This was his first year of high school and it was a little rough for him but when he got some outside resources it kind of really help to reel him back in a little bit.”

Henderson said YAP Advocate Jahwan Edwards has taught her son a lot of things from a male perspective that she isn’t able to.

“My son knows that Jahwan focuses personally on him during their one-on-one time,” Henderson said, adding that he’s taken him to the gym, out to eat and to meet other young men his age.

YAP Program Coordinator Makita Gordon put the Paint and Chill event together to celebrate moms whose children are making progress as YAP Youth Justice Program participants.

“You forget about yourself, especially when you’re a mom, because it’s all about the kids.  I just wanted to create something that was all about the moms.,” she said.

Gordon, who interacts with the parents and guardians of the program participants at intake and follows up with them weekly to access their needs, said she chose a Paint and Chill affair because it has personally helped her relief stress in the past and she wanted to introduce the parents to something that they might not have been exposed to before.

“The moms are the ones who are in court, they are the ones who have to keep up with all these programs, deal with people visiting in-and-out of their homes, and the moms forget about their own self-care because either their child is locked up or they’re worried about them being locked up or they’re in the streets and worried about whether or not they’re going to survive,” Gordon said.

Gordon enlisted the help of Tanzania Stewart of Creative Society to help guide the moms in painting.

“Painting is a stress reliever because you put all your stress on that canvass, turn on some music and it just takes you away,” Stewart said. “You get wrapped up in your picture. The best part is that people don’t have to follow my color pattern, they can do their own thing.”

Gordon hopes to hold a Paint and Chill, for program participants next.

“Painting is like a coping mechanism in a sense because I’ve been through some things in my life,” Gordon said. “It wasn’t until I did a paint and sip that I found out what painting could do for me. I don’t know how to paint, draw or any of that, but when I went and did it, it just gave me so much confidence. It really brings assurance to feel like you accomplish something through art.”

The event took place at YAP’s Charlotte office on Beatties Ford Road.

To learn more about YAP visit yapinc.org and follow the nonprofit on Twitter @YAPInc.

Newark, NJ — Essex County, New Jersey Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. hosted a special graduation ceremony this month for 30 participants of a pilot program that supports individuals leaving prison when their sentences “max out.” The program is a partnership between YAP and the New Jersey Department of Corrections (NJDOC), which connects individuals to the program up to 180 days before their release date.

“When you max out, you return to society often after many years in prison, with no supervision, but also with no support,” said Program Director Edwin “Chino” Ortiz who oversees the pilot, working alongside his brother, Program Coordinator Carmelo “Melo” Ortiz. The Ortiz brothers maxed out of prison in 2016, each after serving 30 years. When Edwin was 19 and Carmelo was 20, they were convicted on charges related to the death of man during a robbery.

Incarcerated people often choose to max out rather than taking a chance on a parole hearing where additional time might be added to their sentences, the Ortiz brothers said. They added that 50-75 percent of people leaving prison in New Jersey are technically maxing out.

“I knew Chino and Melo from prison and worked with them before I got out,” said 51-year-old Maurice Romero. “When I got out, they brought me to the office, gave me a huge backpack with clothes, gift cards, everything I needed. They took me to the bus station to get bus cards, helped me get reduced rent for the apartment, and gave me suits for job interviews.”

Romero returned to Newark in April after serving 36 years in prison for purposeful or knowing murder and felony murder. At age 15, he accompanied two boys to a robbery that he quickly fled from when he realized it was a home invasion of an elderly couple. When police arrested him the next day, he learned that the wife was raped before being killed by one of the boys who pled guilty and remains in prison for those and additional crimes committed during his incarceration. Romero, who now has a full-time job and an apartment, and is pursuing a master’s degree in criminal justice, credits the YAP re-entry program for preparing him for his transition, transporting him from prison, assisting him with getting his ID, and helping him make the emotional adjustment that comes with living for the first time as a free man.

In addition to presenting certificates of completion to participants, the ceremony recognized local supporters. “Reverend Seth Kaper-Dale received a certificate of appreciation for his unwavering support,” said Carmelo Ortiz. “His organization – The Reform Church of Highland Park Affordable Housing Corporation – supports our program with housing opportunities for our participants. They rent apartments and sublease it to our participants at affordable rates.”

YAP staff Advocates meet program participants at the prison gates on the day of their release and transport them to emergency housing. But before that, while they are still incarcerated, they meet with their YAP Advocates to create strength-based individualized service plans. Later, YAP staff are at each program participant’s side to help with applying for ID cards, accessing food pantries, and connecting with job training, healthcare resources, employment services, educational programs and recreational activities to strengthen family bonds. Participants also take part in weekly support group sessions and benefit from mental health and substance use treatment and restorative justice and other services that provide ways to give back to their communities.

First-year funding for the program will enable YAP to serve up to 70 NJDOC referrals. However, news of the re-entry team’s work has been spreading among men and women who have been in the community for months, even years after maxing out of prison. Adhering to the 47-year-old nonprofit’s No Reject, No Eject policy, the YAP team has also been connecting these “walk-in” program participants with re-entry tools and resources and has invited those who have been successful to also take part in the graduation ceremony.

YAP is a 47-year-old national nonprofit in 33 states and the District of Columbia that partners with youth justice, child welfare, behavioral health, and other systems to provide community-based services as a more effective alternative to youth incarceration and congregate residential placements. In recent years, YAP has also been combining its evidence-based wraparound services model with violence intervention approaches to help communities curb violent crime.

Learn more about YAP at www.YAPInc.org and follow the organization on Twitter @YAPInc.

Prescott, Ariz. — Ten months ago, 15-year-old Tucker could never have imagined being where he is now – off probation with his friends, family and Prescott, Ariz. community members celebrating his achievements.

Tucker recently completed services at Yavapai County, Ariz. Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. YAP is a national nonprofit in 33 states and Washington, D.C. that partners with youth justice, child welfare, behavioral health, and other systems to deliver evidence-based services in families’ homes and communities as an alternative to placement in youth prisons and congregate residential care facilities.

“Before all this, I used to get angry really, really quickly. Since all this has happened, it doesn’t happen as often,” Tucker said.

YAP hires neighborhood-based Advocates who are trained to empower program participants to see and nurture their strengths while connecting them and their parents/guardians and families to educational, economic, and emotional tools to strengthen the youths’ foundation.

Tucker had been on probation for more than a year when he became a YAP participant.

“I met a young man with very little impulse control. Not a good sense of physical and personal boundaries and anger issues. There was also a lot of fear and insecurity with being on probation,” said Tucker’s former YAP Advocate Eric Schulze.

Yavapai County Juvenile Probation Department began referring youths to YAP in 2020 after receiving a program startup grant awarded through the Safely Home Fund, a YAP partnership with Georgetown University’s Center for Juvenile Justice Reform. YAP received an Arizona Governor’s Office of Youth, Faith and Family Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Title II Formula Grant in 2021. That funding enabled YAP to serve 10 youths through October 2022 with the Arizona Community Foundation covering costs of serving two additional program participants.

In the nine months that Tucker was in the program, Schulze spent time with him and his family in their home. He also met with Tucker at school and took him bowling, hiking, and kayaking with other program participants.

“I was getting out of the house and doing stuff. When you’re on probation you’re stuck,” Tucker said.

Schulze saw Tucker eagerly learning new skills while also taking time to motivate and build up his peers.

“It’s been encouraging to see him take on new opportunities,” Schulze said. “He has always had an amazing sense of humor and has known he operates a little different within the world. And he’s ok with being that different person and letting himself shine.”
As Tucker began focusing on his strengths, Schulze encouraged him to take advantage of tutoring and other learning resources at his school.

“This year, I’m doing the best in school than I ever have,” Tucker said. “I’m really good at math. It’s been my best subject – that and homeroom.” Tucker describes homeroom as “a family within a family,” where his classmates shared with him his excitement of being off probation.

Schulze also connected Tucker to the Prescott Valley Park Collective, a community nonprofit, where he satisfied his community service hours and stayed on through YAP Supported Work, where program participants earn income while getting on-the-job experience.

“One of the people I worked with – his name is Coach – it used to take him an hour and a half to clean the playground,” Tucker said. “With me helping him, it takes 45 minutes. It made a difference for him because he got to go home early. You get joy with helping people. I personally try to make everyone feel better.”

Earlier this year, Tucker learned that a planned promotion for his Advocate was put on hold when some anticipated program funding didn’t come through.

“I kept nagging her [Yavapai County YAP Program Director Patty Delp] to give it to him,” he said.

While embarrassed by Tucker’s campaigning, Schulze was proud to see that after months working as his YAP Advocate, the tables had turned with Tucker advocating for him.

“The magic in our model is its simplicity,” Delp said, adding that nine of the 12 youths receiving services over the past year successfully completed the program requirements and all celebrated major milestones.

“These kids are coming to us from the system, and we start our work by looking underneath the trauma that came before the acting out,” Delp said. “These are not bad kids; they’re young people who have had a tough go at it.”

Tucker’s former probation officer Dan Lammers was among those attending his YAP graduation. “We can work together to help kids that are in the system, and the system is not bad or overbearing when the right resources are used to assist in helping our kids move forward,” he said.

Tucker is completing his fall semester with good grades, work experience, a driver’s permit, and new respect and admiration from his family, friends, and community. Meantime, Schulze has been promoted from Advocate to Program Coordinator; and Delp is pursuing funding so that the program can continue serving justice-involved Yavapai County youth for years to come.

Learn more about YAP at www.YAPInc.org and follow the organization on Twitter @YAPInc.

Charlotte, N.C. – Mecklenburg County Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. hosted an Open House on Oct. 26 to welcome program participants, their families, and members of the Beatties Ford Road neighborhood.

The event allowed the community to meet members of Charlotte’s YAP staff including those from the national nonprofit’s Mecklenburg County Youth Justice program and the organization’s Violence Intervention (Alternatives to Violence or ATV) program team.

The YAP Youth Justice Program partners with the court system, where through referrals, program participants get a neighborhood-based Advocate who champions for them and their families, guiding them to achieve positive outcomes. The program is led by Director Malik Glover and Assistant Director India Harrison.

The City of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County, in collaboration with Cure Violence Global (CVG) and YAP launched ATV a year ago in response to reducing violence in the Beatties Ford Road corridor. ATV Site Supervisor Earl Owens and that program’s team members, all of whom are deeply rooted as volunteers and activists on the Beatties Ford Road corridor, were also in attendance.

The Charlotte team is available for support and can help connect youth, families and residents to economic, educational, and emotional tools to achieve positive goals. The afternoon included light refreshments, neighborly support, and an opportunity to view YAP’s new office location on Beatties Ford Road.

YAP is a national nonprofit in 33 states and the District of Columbia that provides community-based services as a more effective alternative to youth incarceration and congregate residential care. YAP combines its wraparound services model with other evidence-based approaches to also provide alternatives to neighborhood violence.

To learn more about YAP visit yapinc.org and follow the nonprofit on Twitter @YAPInc.

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Site Supervisor LaToya Rivers

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Team

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence team; Credible Messenger Chantelle Mitchell speaking

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Interrupter Cornelius Chisolm

Saxophonist Earl White, Jr.

Just Say Grace Catering by Sylvia Evans staff members

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Interrupter Shantone Curry

YAP President Gary Ivory (Plants from Flowers by Eddie)

YAP CMO Kelly Williams with Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Site Supervisor LaToya Rivers, Credible Messenger Chantelle Mitchell and YAP President Gary Ivory

MUSC Turning the Tide Violence Intervention Program (TTVIP) Director and Trauma Surgeon Ashley Hink, M.D. with TTVIP Program Director Christa Green and TTVIP Violence Interruption Advocate Cat Yetman

Open House Day at Midland Park Ministry Center

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence program participant Jaclyn

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Team

YAP Southeast Region Vice President LaVeisha Cummings

MUSC Turning the Tide Violence Intervention Program (TTVIP) Director and Trauma Surgeon Ashley Hink, M.D. and YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Interruptor Shantone Curry

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Site Supervisor LaToya Rivers speaks with a guest

MUSC Turning the Tide Violence Intervention Program (TTVIP) Director and Trauma Surgeon Ashley Hink, M.D.

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Credible Messenger Chantelle Mitchell and open house guest

YAP Lowcountry Rising Above Violence Site Supervisor LaToya Rivers with MUSC Turning the Tide Violence Intervention (TTVIP) Program Director Christa Green

YAP Charleston County, S.C. – Lowcountry Rising Above Violence, Charleston’s new community violence prevention and intervention program, hosted an Open House to introduce themselves and the services they offer.

The program is staffed by employees of Youth Advocate Programs (YAP), Inc. through a partnership with the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). Funded by the Office of Juvenile Justice Prevention (OJJDP), the program is designed to help curb violence among young people ages 10-18 in Charleston and the North Charleston neighborhoods.

The program uses the Cure Violence Global model to detect and interrupt conflicts; identify and treat individuals at the highest-risk of violence engagement; and change social norms, while also delivering YAP wraparound services that empower youth and families with tools to nurture their strengths and put/keep their lives positive trajectory.

YAP is a national nonprofit in 33 states and the District of Columbia that delivers community-based services as a more effective alternative to youth incarceration and out-of-home placement. In recent years, YAP has combined its evidence-based model of hiring and training neighborhood-based staff with shared experience with other evidence-based approaches to help cities curb violence.

The YAP Charleston County team includes Site Supervisor Latoya Rivers, Credible Messenger Chantelle Mitchell and Violence Interrupters Shantone Curry and Cornelius Chisolm.

The team extends special thanks to Midland Park Ministry Center Pastor Jerry Zapata, Just Say Grace Catering by Sylvia Evans, Saxophonist Earl White, Jr., and Flowers by Eddie.

To learn more about YAP visit yapinc.org and follow the nonprofit on Twitter @YAPInc.