Building Young Leaders Who Are Building A Better Los Angeles

Social support networks

Expand existing project, program, or initiative (expanding and continuing ongoing, successful work)

The students that Legacy serves in Los Angeles County are predominantly from low-income backgrounds and are often excluded from opportunities to lead in their community. Too often low-income students are seen as part of the problem; rather than the solution. Low-income students are three times less likely to be able to access leadership programs than their counterparts. By sixth grade, middle-income students will have spent nearly 4,000 more hours in after-school learning programs than their lower-income peers. There needs to be more opportunities for these students to lead their communities and point to a tangible impact on issues that are important to them.
Anxiety and mental health is an epidemic for youth. There needs to be programs that not only prepare students for higher education but also programs that have been shown to provide social and emotional support, essential life skills, and the experience and self-confidence that that they can be and lead the change they want to see.

Our Leadership Program is an in-person skill development and mentorship program that gives low-income high school students the hard and soft skills to use their TIME, MONEY, VOICE AND VOTE to lead their communities. This begins with a two-hour, interactive, workshop-style experience. The students group ranging from 50-200 students. Four pillars make up the in-person leadership experience: 1. Self-Reflection: Students complete a pre- and post-program survey to assess knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and actions within a core set of leadership topics specific to each track. Students also answer multiple reflection questions during the program to grow in their self-awareness of key skill areas. 2. Breakout Groups: Students break out into groups of 3-5 and participate in focused Leadership Q&A sessions.3. Interactive Gameplay: Students participate in multiple icebreaker-like games to reinforce the leadership lessons and skills taught with each track.4. Multimedia Presentation: Students also learn from facilitators through audio and visual presentations. Following this instruction, Legacy students are then matched with a mentor in the Legacy Mentorship Program network to advise them as they complete Legacy Service projects. A student is then supported in creating a Legacy Club.
Legacy is innovative and students are held as valued leaders NOW, in the present and the program acts as a critical intervention, combating mental health issues and greatly increasing economic mobility.

Legacy students revitalize Los Angeles County, beginning from their work as social impact leaders in the present. These programs equip youth with essential life skills often neglected in low-income communities in Los Angeles as well as the benefits correlated between volunteerism, social impact initiatives, and feelings of belongingness among adolescents. Here are a few real life examples of what that can look like:
Summer Yang and Jacob Nguyen who, went on to be the opening keynote speakers at Google HQ and inspired educators from all around the world. Mohammad Mohamayoon, an immigrant from Afghanistan who worked to start a non-profit in his community that provides educational resources for Afghani children. Danny started an Altruism Club at his school that has raised over $10,000 and volunteered hundreds of hours to combat education ineqaulity. Sarah experienced homelessness as teen. Through our programs she is now a speaker and advocate for homeless youth.

We will serve a minimum of 1,250 students in low-income communities in Los Angeles County through our programs. We collect data on our impact and demographic information on the students we work with, identifying the number of students in our target population who are served, and tracking the number of students who achieve the program's outcomes. There are systematic checkpoints to make sure the content is being understood. The Education team also collects data directly from the student groups through standardized digital pre- and post-program evaluations, as well as self-reflection reports and multiple benchmark surveys throughout the instruction which measure the impact of the program in real time. After instruction, we continue to gather the data during Legacy students' skill-development journey as they are tasked with reporting quantitative data related to their original project goals. We are continually in touch with how the young leaders' with post-program case studies.