The City of Milwaukee Youth Council ’s Collaboration Committee invites local youth-led and youth-serving organizations to join the Milwaukee Youth Alliance (MYA), a new youth-led coalition of groups being organized by the Youth Council.
Organizations are invited to fill out a membership form (attached) to join the MYA, and as members of the alliance, organizations appoint youth representatives who attend meetings and vote on behalf of the organization. The goal is to decrease the divisions between existing organizations that often do not communicate with each other, though they are working on similar issues.
In addition, interested adults are invited to join the Adult Advisory Board (form also attached), which will support and provide guidance to the youth-led Youth Alliance.
Both forms will be collected at the first meeting of the Milwaukee Youth Alliance and the Advisory Board to be held on Monday, August 6 from 3:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. at the Violence Prevention Initiative, 1801 N. Martin Luther King Dr.
Youth officers for the Youth Alliance, including two co-chairs and two secretaries, will also be elected at the August 6 meeting. Organizations are welcome to bring any youth interested in those positions to the meeting.
Francis Klein, chair of the Youth Council’s Collaboration Committee, which worked to form the Alliance , said “Our community desperately needs the Milwaukee Youth Alliance to bridge the divide between organizations to create better communities and neighborhoods for our youth.”
The Youth Council’s Collaboration Committee held two organizational sessions with several youth organizations in the community in mid-July to craft the constitution of the MYA. Those groups involved in the process include Urban Underground, the ACLU of Wisconsin Youth Alliances, Urban De’version Social Club, the Violence Prevention Initiative, Pearls for Teen Girls, Youth Empowered in the Struggle, Safe and Sound, and TRUE Skool, among others.
The Collaboration Committee now calls on the greater community to embrace the vision and structure of the body by joining the MYA or its Advisory Board.
“The time for action is now. We look forward to working with the newly-created Milwaukee Youth Alliance to create a better future for our city and our city’s youth,” Klein said.
