Youth Forward MKE Coalition Uplifts Youth Voice
Youth Forward MKE is on a mission to uplift youth voice as part of its larger goal of ending educational inequity in Milwaukee. The Coalition’s June meeting, attended by over 50 youth and community leaders, served as a testament to the power of youth voice – and a call to city leaders to stand up and take notice.
Fittingly, the event opened with an introduction by 2022 Youth Forward MKE Ambassador Amaya Bauldwin. “I decided to become a Youth Forward ambassador to give people like myself a platform to comfortably speak for themselves and know they are being listened to,” she said.
What followed was an inspiring, collaborative conversation that explored the recent MPS Student Voice Project, the benefits of mentoring and the future of the Design Your Future proposals – all beneath the banner of uplifting and celebrating youth voice.
The MPS Student Voice Project
This year, Milwaukee Succeeds partnered with MPS around their Youth Leadership Summit and Student Discipline Committees to better understand and address the challenges youth are facing. The resulting Student Voice Project revealed students’ perceptions on school culture, relationships and discipline.
One of the main themes that emerged from the research is that relationships with teachers and staff matter – yet they’re currently not living up to students’ expectations.
“Students are naming that currently the relationships that they have with adults are in crisis,” said Clintel Hasan, strategic initiatives manager at Milwaukee Succeeds. “It is important for them to build positive relationships with their teachers.”
The extensive time students spend on laptops and the high number of substitute teachers further impede the creation of those relationships. Then, without a solid foundation of trust and respect between both parties, issues arise in terms of discipline and punishment, where students report extensive inequity. These issues also feed into students’ concerns around mental health, where youth are demanding additional supports.
While the Student Voice Project provided invaluable feedback on what students need, there are still concerns about the process. Amaya Bauldwin, who served on the Citywide Code of Conduct Committee, shared her experience.
“We were heard,” she said. “They listened to us, but I'm not sure that they acted on what we said.”
Youth Forward MKE aims to be different. For the Coalition, such information not only informs the work but drives it, actively affecting their plans and partnerships.
Separately, in response to recent events and youth calls for greater mental health supports, the Greater Milwaukee Foundation has awarded $100,000 to the Coalition to invest in youth-identified violence prevention programming. The goal is to increase access to mental health supports and create more equitable and inclusive school environments, with the youth ambassadors providing feedback and insight on approved grants.
MENTOR Greater Milwaukee
The Student Voice Project made it clear that relationships are essential for Milwaukee’s youth – and MENTOR Greater Milwaukee is working to build and strengthen such relationships across the city. The organization, which acts as one of the co-leads for Youth Forward MKE, aims to increase the number of mentoring relationships by building the capacity of existing programs.
The data on mentoring speaks for itself. According to Betty Hill, MENTOR’s director of youth development and strategic partnerships, having this “guide on the side” means youth are 52% less likely than their peers to skip school, 55% more likely to enroll in college and 130% more likely to hold a leadership position. Bringing it full circle, 90% of those mentees are more likely to become mentors themselves.
“We want volunteer mentors to understand that you can come in and work with our young people if you're willing to do two main things,” said LaNelle Ramey, MENTOR’s executive director. “Come in, willing to be vulnerable enough to share your story, but then come in committed to cultural competency and work alongside of young people.”
From their Mentoring Connector tool, which showcases mentor programs and connects families and potential mentors, to their summer social justice ambassadors, who are learning how to use their voices to create positive change in the community, it’s clear that MENTOR is a crucial component of Milwaukee’s youth landscape, providing support and training where it’s needed most.
Last summer’s Design Your Future fellows seemed to agree. In their proposals on how to enhance high school education in Milwaukee, they explicitly called on MENTOR as an ideal implementation partner.
Design Your Future Proposals
“I'm a firm believer that when you create the right conditions in the right space, young people are going to show up,” said David Emmanuelle Castillo, founder of Equitable Systems Consultants.
Last summer’s Design Your Future Fellowship was precisely that right kind of space, with 58 young people showing up to create proposals on how to improve high school for Black male youth. David, who’s taken the lead in creating implementation plans for the projects, provided an update during the summer meeting.
Originally ideated as six different plans, the ideas have been consolidated into three proposals.
Proposal 1 includes a three-pronged approach aimed at making mental health a standard practice in schools, beginning with District Four. By partnering with SKY Schools, they plan to incorporate more robust mental health and wellness programming into schools, providing healthy and constructive ways for students to deal with stress and trauma. Then, through MENTOR Greater Milwaukee and the Department of Black and Latino Male Achievement, they’ll expand mentoring and peer-to-peer support networks. Finally, with help from the Coalition of Anti-Racist and Restorative Educators, they’ll roll out training to help teachers and staff develop their own cultural and racial competency, thereby improving the relationships between students and staff – as youth have explicitly called out.
Proposal 2 involves after school wraparound supports, which would provide mental, physical and spiritual wellness programming for students who need additional resources. To be housed in the makerspace at the developing ThriveOn King building, this piece will include access to such partners as Vertical Essences Dance Company, Brazilian Joy Yoga and Fort Farms, all of whom youth named as important stakeholders. Not only that, but youth will also have the opportunity to shape what the makerspace looks like as the build-out of ThriveOn continues.
Proposal 3 revolves around the creation of an autonomous youth council, which would simultaneously create a pipeline to attract local talent into education and act as an intergenerational network of practitioners.
“There’s been conversations on a national level about teacher shortages coming,” said David. “A way to get ahead of that issue is to start planning now and creating a pipeline where we attract local people into the field of education. And that’s a way to ensure we get people from the community to come back and teach in their community.”
The process, similar to Philadelphia Freedom Schools, would involve developing students’ “pedagogical toolbelts” during high school. Once they graduate, they would receive college credit toward an education degree, then eventually a signing bonus for coming back to teach in their community. This proposal would also provide a way for youth to explore and inform policies and practices, as well as bridging the divide between youth and adults. Potential partners include Marquette University, the Black Educators Caucus and HIR Wellness Institute, among others.
Get Involved
“I want to encourage other youth to speak up,” said ambassador Amaya Bauldwin. “So we are asking that if any of you have affiliations or are part of a youth-serving organization or program to follow up with us.”
Youth Forward MKE is also fundraising $600,000 to implement the youth-generated Design Your Future proposals. A donation – big or small – will help make these incredible ideas into reality.
To stay up-to-date on the work of our youth ambassadors, follow Youth Forward MKE on Instagram or TikTok. And mark your calendars for the next quarterly meeting on September 28 from 4-5:30 p.m., during which the Coalition will be highlighting youth leadership and advocacy groups.
