| Purpose : |
This 3 year initiative will directly address the issue of youth crime in approximately 100 communities across Canada and directly benefit approximately 10,000 youth within the first year. The sponsor will organize and deliver a series of weekend workshops/seminars in 10 select communities involving Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia, the Yukon, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick. Participants will include local youth, municipal and other community decision-makers, youth service providers, parents, volunteers and representatives of existing youth centres. The workshops/seminars hosting communities were selected on the basis of their proximity and commitment to engage the participation of 10 additional neighbouring communities and including a minimum of 30 - 40 participants.
The project will enhance local youth centre operations and increase youth participation rates by introducing youth friendly programs, sharing tested and proven capacity-building / sustainability tools and enhancing community centre networking through connectivity to the TYPS website. These enhancements will increase both the community and national profile of youth centres, resulting in their increased usage (sustainability) and effectiveness in building protective factors in youth.
TYPS research demonstrates that youth centres are at the forefront of reducing at-risk factors and behaviours among youth, while building the protective factors that sustain them through life. Related research confirms an overall rise in at-risk behaviours amongst the general population of youth throughout their teen years, while those youth that participate in youth centres activities experience a dropping off of the same at-risk behaviours despite the fact that the majority of youth currently attending community centres are already in a higher-risk sector of the youth population. Other research confirms that youth in crisis turn twice as often to youth centres for support, advice, and assistance, than to any other community community-based facility or resource.
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