Launching the New Building and Offering New Hope

May 6, 2009 marked a special day in the life of the KC Urban Youth Center: the dedication of our new building that will help us better serve the youth in our community. It was a wonderful celebration and we were pleased that so many members of the KCUYC family were there to celebrate with us.

It took about 2 ½ years for the structure at 2740 Troost to be transformed from a dark, empty warehouse into a bustling and lively place where young people hang out and grow. As hundreds of individuals, companies and churches poured themselves—their time, treasure and talent—into the facility’s infrastructure, their investment in and relationship with our students grew to new heights. More than just giving us extra room for our programs, this building project was really about working together and redeeming this space; the end result is a stronger KCUYC and a larger commitment to our local community, our extended family, and most importantly, to each other.

While reflecting this month on where the KCUYC has come from and where we are going, we engaged our student leaders—youth who have been a part of our programs since we began in 2004—in conversations about how the KCUYC has impacted and changed their lives. This is what 18-year old Neveah shared with us:

"The KC Urban Youth Center has helped me change my life for the better by providing for me a dream and goals; and enabling me to see to it that those goals are met. The Center showed me I have options; before I came to the KCUYC I wasn’t going to go to college. I don’t know what my life would be like now...without a goal, without a plan. The KCUYC helped me see that there is a different way to go then what I often see in my community, in the other kids around me...I know now that I have options, and because of the KCUYC, I have the opportunity to make my dreams come true."

In the fall, Neveah will become the third graduate of the KCUYC to attend a Christian liberal arts university.

On May 6, we had an official ribbon-cutting ceremony to dedicate our new building. Because of your partnership with us, hundreds of urban youth have now been empowered to dream new dreams...BIG dreams. It is the collaborative work of the whole KCUYC family—students, parents, volunteers, donors, board members and staff—that continue to transform dreams into reality. THANK YOU!

But of-course our work isn’t finished—not even close. The needs of our students and their families are great and the number of students we serve is ever-increasing. Would you take a moment today to renew your commitment and invest in the continuation and expansion of the KCUYC? Our 5-year goal, together with you, will be to more than double the number of youth we serve. Please join with us and help us as we take this next step of faith so that more students like Neveah will dream dreams and be empowered to reach the goals they are establishing for their lives. Go to www.kcurbanyouthcenter.org/givenow.htm

Blessings,


Chuck Sailors
President/CEO