Urban Extreme is a non-profit organization, which seeks to rebuild communities by comprehensively influencing the lives of youth, and their families in addressing the education, health, economic, and social needs of hurting people based on wholistic principles. We are passionate about transforming our community through the lives of young people.
Our organization is requesting this grant to support young people in becoming change agents in their communities. We have created the following goals for our organization: 100% of youth mentored will attain the required grade-level credits for promotion100 % of youth mentored will graduate high school on time100% of youth mentored will attend school 95% of the time100 % of youth mentored will develop a theory of change model for a problem in their community100% of youth mentored and their families will participate in health, economic development, and social development workshops
Urban Extreme Youth Development became a 501 C3 in June of 2020. In 2018, our President, Dr. Debora Carrera, wanted to create an organization that would empower young people from North Philadelphia, specifically the Kensington community where she grew up and worked, to strive to become the leaders of their communities through the power of education and self-empowerment. Prior to becoming an “”official”” non-profit, the organization worked in the community for over 20 years with Urban Worship Center, through Chosen Generation Youth Ministries.
In the spring of 2018 and 2019, the organization held two girls’ empowerment conferences called, Bold and Beautiful Girls Conference, #BBGC at Kensington High School. Prior to Covid 19, the organization was able to provide a one-day girls conference to students at the Kensington High School catchment area. The conference was designed to empower, build and sustain a positive self-image for female students of Kensington High school through workshops focusing on college and career readiness, healthy eating, positive relationships, self-care, and the arts.
Currently, we are mentoring high school students on a weekly basis, Friday nights at Urban Worship Center. These high school students are from various neighborhoods in Philadelphia but most are from the Kensington area. Our Friday night mentoring has served a few purposes, providing students with a safe place to meet, developing their leadership skills, and providing hands-on mentoring through outings and cultural events. This summer we were able to provide students summer internships where students learned how to work with media and specific programs such as Adobe and Pro presenter. Students worked on a design thinking model around gun violence in Kensington, where students brainstormed ideas to help address the problem of gun violence. Students were able to create a survey and interview residents of Kensington to get their ideas on how to solve the gun violence program in Philadelphia.
