Our Academics – Measurable Impact Across the Nation

From Sea to Shining Sea across this vast nation from Honolulu, Hawaii, Salt Lake City, Utah, Detroit, Michigan, and Washington D.C. region we influenced the life direction, catapulted leadership, and impacted over 400 at-risk youth, 87 NCAA Student-Athletes, 23 Marines, 14 Public School Teachers and 7 Army Soldiers. Our overall achieved academic impact showed a 20% increase from pre and post-testing of our programs this summer! Thank you for your support to enable us to Win!!!!

Our YIP programs across the nation stepped it up with significant progression in Academics which challenged our youth and they rose to the challenge. Our teachers raised the bar even higher and developed an additional curriculum that involved advanced concepts. They faced students from across the spectrum of below grade and above grade levels to special needs. This year especially, we had a significant amount of special needs youth intermixed across our programs. Our youth were tasked with not only completing projects but applying real-life solutions to their everyday problems together.

With English/Language Arts, programs began reading or reviewing the Crash book by Jerry Spinelli. The more seasoned programs moved onto sports articles and even poetry. Using different techniques like a vocab scavenger hunt made it fun and enjoyable to learn. There was an overall average increase of 28% in vocab.

Mathematics skills level ranged from word problems involving multiple ways of thinking to ratios and proportions unit rates using real prices on various products found in stores. Our teachers made academic learning applicable to real-life scenarios. As math became more advanced and challenging this year, it became apparent in the post-testing with an average increase of 12%. Our Michigan YIP achieved their
greatest academic gains in science adding a STEM activity. They worked in groups to create an astronaut out of ultraviolet light-sensitive beads and a shelter to keep them safe from the rays of the sun.

The Life Skills portion was a reflection into their own lives with speakers drawing in from their personal experience and struggles. Through this lens, they shared how they persevered through those hardships and became resilient, in order for them to get to where they are today. Speakers from the community would visit the program, but most impactful were the stories shared by their very own mentors, the Student-Athletes and Marines. This setting allowed for a raw and vulnerable dynamic between mentor and students with open discussions free of judgment that resulted in trust. This trust breaks through social injustices and ignites their passion to learn and galvanizes their grit to overcome the challenges they face to win. We are instilling them with faith and trust to achieve, and they are making their families and communities better.

We strongly stand by with our commitment to these youth, their communities, and the collective team from these four universities: the University of Hawaii, the University of Maryland, the University of Michigan, and the University of Utah to lead and make an impact.

Let’s help change our Nation to be better!!

View our programs in action here: