Youth Development Institute (YDI)
This report serves as a guide for forming partnerships between community-based organizations and colleges that want to engage “disconnected” youth in post-secondary education. It draws from the experience of YDI’s Community Education Pathways to Success (CEPS) program and various GED and pre-college academic preparation and GED and transitional programs at City University of New York. One of the report’s most important reminders is that when it comes to preparing “disconnected” youths for college, there are no shortcuts, and a lot of effort must be put into motivating and preparing the youths to acquire certain habits of mind to take full advantage of what a post-secondary education has to offer. It encourages practitioners not to think that merely telling youths what they need to know to succeed in college is going to have an impact.
“Perhaps most important, students need to become familiar with the characteristic organization of informational materials (such as college catalogues) and knowledgeable about what might be considered ‘the vocabulary of college,’ ” the report states. “These are also not simple matters, and an approach to informing students about them that relies on telling them what they need to know will all but certainly prove ineffective.” The report also lists the essential aspects of effective CBO-college partnerships.
Free, 64 pages. http://www.ydinstitute.org/resources/index.html.
