News & Press

I have just returned from YouthBuild’s 30th anniversary celebration and it has been several days of what has felt like a family reunion in the nicest sense — old and new friends, funders and supporters, students and graduates, staff from local programs and from the national office were all at this event.

We had a multi-day celebration in DC where YouthBuild’s National Young Leaders Council met; the National Directors Association held its annual meeting; as part of service day YouthBuild students and graduates built a green home on the national mall that has now been shipped to a family devastated by hurricanes in Brownville, TX; and we held a gala dinner to recognize graduates with awards for post secondary attainment, entrepreneurship, home ownership, leadership etc. Finally, today students went to Capitol Hill to meet with their congressional representatives and champions to thank them for their support and to tell their stories of struggle and success.

All of this has been going on for several days now and the highlight of it all was that the first lady came to see the house on the mall and to speak with the students — you can imagine the excitement of students and staff when she showed up and stayed for a while to chat with individual students and speak to the crowd. Senator John Kerry, Representative Eleanor Holmes Norton, Martin Luther King III, Senator John Lewis, DOL staff and other friends and supporters were at hand as well to encourage students and graduates.

At the dinner last night Steve Patrick from the Gates Foundation gave the Education award to a Sudanese graduate who has earned a Masters Degree in International Community Economic Development and is working to start YouthBuild programs in Sudan. Joe Scantlebury joined us as well with his son and it was great to have them join us in the euphoria of the evening.