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Program History

Over the years, CYC has partnered with students, schools, and community agencies to significantly reduce the dropout rate in Colorado. This includes programming that has evolved and will continue to evolve to support young people.

Colorado Youth for a Change began by providing reengagement services to out-of-school youth in 2005 through the Reengagement Program. Denver Public Schools was our first partner in this work; 55 young people reenrolled in school that first year. From 2008-2020, CYC created and managed both Futures Academy and the Educational Intervention program.

In partnership with Aurora Public Schools, the Futures Academy school program combined GED preparation with post-secondary concurrent enrollment. Hundreds of young people earned a GED as well as technical certificates, college credits, and associate degrees through this program.

Educational Intervention supported 9th grade students with the transition to high school. Thousands of students raised failing grades to passing grades in partnership with CYC staff who were embedded in schools. Each passing grade helps increase the chances of students staying on-track and eventually graduating.

In 2015, CYC started leveraging the power of AmeriCorps to reach more students. Corps for a Change started first in response to chronic absenteeism in high school. The nationally replicated Colorado Reading Corps followed in 2017 to support children not reading on grade level in PreK-3rd grade. Both programs support students at critical junctures in school, increasing their chances of eventually graduating.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on students and families, CYC also added the Student Engagement Corps during the 2019-2020 school year. An additional 2,500 students were supported with tutoring, attendance check-ins, connection to basic needs, technology support, and so much more.

CYC saw continued evolution in the 2021-2022 school year as the nationally replicated Colorado Math Corps joined CYC programming. In 2022, Early Reading Corps was designated as its own program and renamed to Colorado Early Learning Corps.

The 2022-2023 school year allowed CYC to launch a new mission and vision to better reflect our work across Colorado. Staff members and the Board of Directors worked together on this project which helped launch the new three-year strategic plan.  Our support of older youth continued to evolve at this time too, adding staff to support truancy efforts through the Reengagement Program in partnership with Denver Public Schools. At the same time, the organization took leadership of the Denver Opportunity Youth Initiative, formerly led by the Metro Denver Chamber of Commerce, to build better systems and opportunities for youth/young adults 16-24. Both of these shifts deepened the organization’s continuum of support at pivotal stages in a young person’s educational journey.

In the fall of 2024, the organization received additional funding from the Aspen Institute through the Scaling Youth Outcomes Cohort. The $1.5 million investment over three years is scaling promising programs that support with reengagement and paths toward post-secondary while pulling together partners to gather and analyze data to better support students who’ve disengaged or are at-risk of doing so. This investment allowed CYC to once again add to its Reengagement Program which now serves Denver Public Schools, Englewood Schools, and Aurora Public Schools.

*As a national leader, CYC is cited as effectively using AmeriCorps members to increase community impact in “Service Years as a Strategy to Improve Education Outcomes” (Service Year, 2018), is featured in the United States Department of Education Reengagement Guide (2014), and is featured in the National League of Cities’ Addressing Student Reengagement in the Time of Covid-19 Resource Guide (2021).

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