Youth Rebuild a Miss. Community and Their Own Futures

By Dorothy Stoneman | January 2, 2007

I started YouthBuild years ago because I had heard clearly from young people in East Harlem that they wanted to make a difference, rebuild their own communities, and help their neighbors. They told me that one day we would spread love around the world. In Gulfport, Miss., I am watching their vision come to life.

Over Thanksgiving, my husband and I were inspired by a special YouthBuild project: Dozens of YouthBuild graduates are rebuilding homes destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. Since July, YouthBuild AmeriCorps volunteers have rehabbed 45 homes in Gulfport. As always, the young people are deeply sincere and earnest about their work. They want hurricane victims to have hope. They also want a chance to plan their own futures within the stability of the program.

A few weeks later, I was filled with pride, watching former President Jimmy Carter tour some of the 15 homes we had rebuilt in partnership with Habitat for Humanity. By the summer, we hope to have helped rebuild 300 homes.

YouthBuild is a national program that engages unemployed and undereducated young people ages 16-24 - most of whom are young men who have left high school without a diploma. In YouthBuild, they work toward their GEDs or high school diplomas while constructing housing for low-income people. A caring mini-community is created, with an emphasis on leadership development, to enable the students to take responsibility for improving their communities and world while they prepare to pursue their own dreams. Since 1994, more than 60,000 YouthBuild students have produced 15,000 units of affordable housing. Most have gone on to good jobs and/or college.

Like the Gulfport residents, YouthBuild students know poverty and hopelessness. Many have been involved with foster care or juvenile justice, have been on welfare, or have been homeless. Many say, "Without YouthBuild I would be dead or in jail." Instead, they develop dreams and goals that previously seemed unthinkable. "At the top of my game, I want to be an economist and a developer, and rejuvenate my home city of Youngstown," one graduate volunteer told me in Gulfport.

Much of the credit goes to YouthBuild staff, who insist on high expectations and respect. It's a family-like environment that fills a void left by absent families. At the same time, YouthBuild students take pride in the tangible results of a renovated house. The students come to respect themselves and realize the satisfaction that comes from contributing to the community.

Joining the Gulfport group for Thanksgiving was a joy that confirmed our purpose. Change is possible, and some of the poorest people who have personally overcome the most daunting obstacles are always the most eager to be the agents of change to help other people.