The Year of the YAT

The Youth Action Team (YAT) is a group of students that run the annual Youth Leadership Academy. This year, they fought through snow and sleet and the crushing weight of increasing responsibility to pull off a fantastic academy. Each month they met and planned. They argued, compromised, encouraged one another, and cooperated until they had a strong vision for the 2014 YLA.

The group had a January kickoff wherein last year's YLA participants met at Salisbury University for a conference focusing on leadership values and basic life skills. We played games with local leaders, like Councilman Jacob Day, and heard Charlie Endicott of Salisbury University, speak on career planning.

Throughout the rest of the year, the students met to begin planning the YLA. We started off meeting in the Wicomico Public Library, but eventually had the opportunity to take advantage of meeting at the +Community Foundation of the Eastern Shore, Inc.  which is a great community resource.

Having a meal together was important to the YAT for several reasons. Primarily, since we met from 5:30 to 7:30 each evening, we wanted to make sure everyone was fed and alert for the duration of the meeting. Secondly, though, since the students were from disparate neighborhoods, schools, and backgrounds, it was important to give them some time to get to know one another socially as the weeks progressed. The CFES was great for our needs, Not only were there better facilities for enjoying our dinners...

.. but when the World Cup heated up, we were able to watch the game during the meeting. Several of the girls on the YAT were not interested in soccer, but agreed to put on the game in deference to their colleagues. As the U.S. played Belgium to a tie and goalie Tim Howard made unreasonable save after unreasonable save, the girls were screaming with every blocked shot, then demanding explanations from their fellows in the quiet time so they could better understand what was going on. For all the meetings and practices, this was the kind of experience that separated the YAT from an ordinary club.

Throughout the year, many of the YAT also participated in the +Make it Matter Movement projects, which allowed the two groups to better coalesce. MiM members learned about the necessity of practicing leadership as well as stewardship, and the YAT got to see the premises of leadership they were discussing put into action.  In all, it was a strong, group of youth that eventually became the core of what we hope will by the YAT of the future.

Each week, we planned a little more and, by the time August rolled around, we were ready for the Youth Leadership Academy.  The YLA was a massive success and, over the next few posts, we'll take you day by day through the successes and challenges of the YLA...