The Garden City Community Coalition and Thrive have submitted a video to the “A Community Thrives”, a USA TODAY NETWORK nation-wide program. The goal of the A Community Thrives program is to provide the resources necessary for community philanthropic missions to succeed. Seeing as Thrive’s mission is to cultivate a Garden City that is safe, healthy, and drug-free; what better way to achieve this than through youth empowerment. Thrive members chose the Wellness- Physical & Mental Health category to focus on for their submission.
Thrive knows that strong community involvement and positive peer groups are essential for teens to be healthy and successful. Last year, a youth drug-free coalition was organized at Garden City High School. This group of rock star youth meets weekly to plan community service and public awareness campaigns about topics related to healthy living that they feel are relevant to their peers and their community. The coalition’s objectives are to collaborate with community leaders, advocate for healthy lifestyles, inform the community about the dangers or substance abuse, and educate their peers about safety and wellbeing.
Due to the increasing youth drug problem in the Garden City area and the success of the youth coalition at the high school, Thrive is committed to organizing a youth coalition at Garden City middle school and to implement age-appropriate educational presentations at the local elementary schools. The cultivation of positive youth groups and activities, in the entire Garden City school district, is the overarching goal of Thrive for this project.
The “A Community Thrives” grant would give the expansion of the youth coalitions project the fuel it needs to make change in this community. All the funds would go directly to youth ideas on how to educate their peers, enabling them to become change agents in their community.