The Rose Community Foundation will host an event at the Cable Center on Sept. 14 to award grants through its
Innovate for Good program, which is supporting youth projects and youth-adult projects with a total of $250,000. The program announced the nine finalists for the youth-adult partnerships this week and will choose the six awardees, each of which will receive $30,000 to realize their projects, at the event.
The organization already selected four youth-led projects to each receive a $5,000 grant and support to realize their projects. The youth awards will support the
CeC Early College Mentorship Program, which will mentor-match high school junior students with high-school freshmen; the
Juniors for Seniors project to build one-on-one relationships with teen volunteers and nursing home residents; the
Stories Worth Saving project for teens to document stories of assisted-living residents; and the
Theatre for Social Change Group project which aims to offer teens ways to use the arts to explore difficult social issues.
For 2016, the second year for the awards, the foundation asked youth and youth partnering with adults to develop projects that answer the question: "What idea could you bring to life to empower youth to make the community better?"
Last year's awards challenge didn't have a thematic focus, according to Sarah Indyk, Rose Community Foundation's director of special projects. This year it was separated into two different pathways, with the youth awards and the youth-adult awards. "The youth-led projects were really conceived of by youths without formal adult partners," she explains. She adds that since the adult-youth partnership projects are a lot different it made sense to go through a parallel process; the Sept. 14 event will decide which youth-adult projects will be funded.
“Both groups will benefit from extensive training coaching and support from the Youth Leadership Institute,” Indyk says. "We're running a full incubator providing support to all awardees and finalists. It's a way we could support all the finalists even if they don't receive funds. That amounts to $50,000 in additional support."
Visit
rcfdenver.org/IFG to learn more about the program and finalists.
Contact Confluence Denver Innovation & Jobs News Editor Chris Meehan with tips and leads for future stories at chris@confluence-denver.com.
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