Positive Youth Development State and Local Collaboration Demonstration Projects
Fiscal Year 2005 Highlights: Massachusetts

Local community: Grove Hall neighborhood, Roxbury, Boston

A 95 percent minority community, Grove Hall suffers from healthcare and economic challenges and high crime, ranking among the Boston neighborhoods with the highest number of shootings per year. At the same time, the neighborhood boasts strong faith- and community-based organizations and community associations.

The City of Boston and the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services are working with other State and local entities, including nonprofit organizations, adult community members, and youth, to assess what Grove Hall youth need and what opportunities exist for them. Together, the project partners will build a strategy that will result in better outcomes for young people. A primary goal of the project is to increase the role that young people from Grove Hall and other challenged neighborhoods in Boston play in identifying neighborhood problems—and coming up with ways to solve them.

Partners:

Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services
Children’s Services of Roxbury and its Youth and Police in Partnership program
Comprehensive Community Safety Initiative
Project RIGHT (Rebuild and Improve Grove Hall Together)
Roca, Inc.
Youth Services Provider Network

In Fiscal Year 2005, the Massachusetts project

• Provided educational and afterschool opportunities
  
• Assisted in gang intervention and other violence prevention efforts
  
• In collaboration with young people, developed a prototype youth development survey, which will be administered by youth to youth
  
• Developed a curriculum for family group support sessions for Grove Hall families
  
• Established a statewide network of planning and review teams that mandate family and youth involvement
  
• Improved information sharing among the State’s education, child protection, and juvenile justice agencies

Challenges to the collaboration project’s work include

• Funding delays
  
• Respecting the “turf,” boundaries, and roles of community organizations participating in the project while at the same time supporting collaboration efforts
  
• Staff turnover in Grove Hall and with the State agency