|
The Aspen Youth Center ("AYC") is a private non-profit corporation that was developed in cooperation with the Aspen Substance Awareness Project now called Valley Partnership for Drug Prevention, Aspen School District, City of Aspen and other interested commuinty members. Due to community concern about the widespread use of alcohol and drugs in the adult community of Aspen, the American Drug and Alcohol Survey was administered to Aspen students in grades 7-12 in 1987. The survey revealed an alarming substance abuse problem among our teens with drug use far above both Colorado and national averages. Following the release of these results, the goal of creating a youth center was established by students (participants represented grades 5-12) at an annual "Views of Youth" conference. After a successful three-year campaign to raise the funds needed to build a center on land owned by the City of Aspen, we opened our doors on October 31, 1991. In April of 2003, we relocated our operations to a new facility, the Aspen Recreation Center ("ARC") on Maroon Creek Road across from the Aspen School District campus. We are the only privately funded and operated non-proft youth center in Colorado. Besides being a youth center, we have grown throughout the years and provide a variety of other programs such as our Education Series event, Boys to Men/Men to Boys, Girls to Women/Women to Girls, and an 8th grade Lead & Serve training.
The Board of Directors has, since our inception, been comprised of equal numbers of youth and adults. In addition, program planning fully incorporates the ideas of participants. We work very hard at "walking our talk" and being an organization that not only says we value our kids, but we actively include them in all aspencts of the operation. This is the piece of our history of which we are most proud.
|
