Over the summer, kids from our Youth Learning and Leadership program had the opportunity to collaborate with local artist and educator Dylan Yarbrough on his project “I am an Eclipse.” The resulting writing and portrait of one of our students, Kevin Bastulo, was selected this past fall to be exhibited at the Cleve Carney Museum of Art in Glen Ellyn, IL. We are so proud of Kevin and all of our youth for their hard work and creativity.

This past year, our Youth Program also launched a partnership with Televisa Foundation to kick off their Technolochicas initiative, an exciting new opportunity for Latina youth to get involved in the computer sciences in Chicago. To mark the occasion, our youth were able to visit Google’s Chicago headquarters. We are thrilled to offer this program to our youth, and we hope that it will provide them with greater exposure to, and mentorship within, various STEM careers.

Finally, we would like to highlight the Field Day that our highschoolers and Youth Program staff participated in this October at Senn Park for newly arrived children currently residing in city shelters. The event, organized with the help of Chicago Friends School and Sacred Heart Schools Chicago was a great success and allowed children who now find themselves in extraordinary circumstances to just be kids for a day.