The Milford Youth Center would like to congratulate the MYC Skate Park Youth Venture group for receiving a $1,000 seed grand from the United Way of Tri-County Youth Venture last night!
United Way Youth Venture is a social entrepreneurship program for youth ages 12-20. Young people are challenged to identify an issue in their community and create a business plan for a project that will be a viable solution to the issue they have identified. Through United Way Youth Venture, young adults learn valuable skills for future academic or professional pursuits while serving as leaders who impact their community in a positive way.
The team presented their idea to create a skate park at the Milford Youth Center. They are passionate about skateboarding, but have few options for places to skate that are safe or affordable. The team has worked in conjunction with the Milford Youth Center to identify a space in the basement of the building that can be used as a skate park at no charge to any child who attends the Youth Center. The team will conduct lessons at no charge to teach children how to skate safely and will host competitions as fundraisers to support skate park maintenance. The team has an established list of rules that all participants must follow, including that helmets are mandatory.
We would like to thank the panelists who helped make the decision to grant the money and added very valuable input to move forward successfully. The role of a selection panelist is to listen to the team present their project and determine whether or not they have thought the idea through and are prepared to implement it. Panelists had an opportunity to ask questions and offer suggestions to the team. The panelists unanimously approved the project! The panelists included John Tessini, Bob Tremblay, Mike Walsh and Richard Villani .
We would like to thank the youth who worked so hard on this project, the panelists,and especially Jessica Friswell of the United Way of Tri-County’s Youth Venture program!
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