Helping Kids Help Themselves
Youth Cornerstone History
In 1987, Robert H. Macy, Oklahoma County District Attorney, decided to act upon his vision of keeping young people in school and out of the criminal justice system. He committed his resources and hired a Special Programs Coordinator to work with the Director of the Juvenile Division of his office to create solutions to the problem of truancy and the school drop-out rate. He believed that if we could keep young people in school, we would ultimately keep them out of the juvenile criminal justice system, and eventually, the adult criminal justice system. Therefore, those young people would get an education and be prevented from contributing to the daytime crime rate.
The Oklahoma County Coalition of Citizens and Professionals for Youth was created to bring multiple agencies together to address gaps in the system. Out of that effort legislation was passed to allow police officers to intervene with young people who were not in school during school hours. The THRIVE (Truancy Habits Reduced Increasing Valuable Education) Program was developed and opened in an elementary school in OKC. It was staffed by six agencies for a pilot period. During that period, Youth Cornerstone, Inc. was created as a 501(C)3 non-profit organization to accept funding and facilitate and govern juvenile prevention and intervention programs such as this.
Over the years, a number of collaborative programs have been created & implemented to impact young people in a positive direction. The 3D Program was implemented to reward young people who chose to remain drug free. Their rewards included discounts in the community and special events. YouthLink was a public-private partnership effort conceptualized by the Youth-At-Risk Initiative, another interagency coalition. Beginning with the faith community, the work of YouthLink was to pair community resources with identified needs in the community.
Youth Cornerstone's next endeavors included Youth As Resources. The work of this group of young people was to assist groups of youth to develop and complete community service projects. Among those projects were: restoring playgrounds and parks; feeding the homeless and distributing card baskets; painting murals to beautify school grounds; establishing libraries and study centers in neighborhoods; providing companionship and assistance to residents of nursing homes; and teen moms educating youth about teen pregnancy and the realities of teen pregnancy.
During the 20 years Youth Cornerstone has been serving the Oklahoma County community, some of these programs have come and gone leaving their mark on all they served. However, Youth Cornerstone's programs have continued to evolve into more powerful and effective services.
Currently, THRIVE assists parents of chronically truant students to recommit to their child's education and focuses on truancy and drop out prevention through mediation and Skills Education Programming. THRIVE operates in partnership with the Oklahoma County District Attorney's Office, The Oklahoma City Police Department and two Oklahoma County school districts: Oklahoma City Public Schools and Putnam City Public Schools.
The Suspension Intervention and Prevention Program (SIPP) is an accountability program for students who are either on long or short term suspension or have been expelled from school. For the duration of their suspension, students come to the SIP Program during school hours to complete their school work and participate in character building and life skills programming.
Another service of Youth Cornerstone is offered through the Art Shaping Character program. ASC is an arts-based character building program that works with children who live in circumstances beyond their control. ASC provides programming to the SIP Program, area elementary schools, group homes and shelters. Projects focus on problems that young people encounter on a daily basis and utilize art as an arena to help express themselves.
During these past 20 years, approximately 27,500 young people and families in Oklahoma County have been served through these programs. As the dynamic entity that is Youth Cornerstone continues to evolve, its services will continue to meet the needs of Oklahoma County youth and families. Although truancy and the drop-out rate are not popular issues, it is obvious that one organization - Youth Cornerstone - will continue to fight the battle against it and create opportunities for prevention & intervention programming.
Once again, a special thanks to the man who had the vision, dedicated his resources, and supported the work that started and sustained Youth Cornerstone's services: Robert H. Macy.
Prepared November 5, 2009 by Pam Harrell