CLARION, Pa. – On Wednesday, October 5, students from across Clarion County came together for the first Clarion County Youth Council (CCYC) meeting of the 2016-2017 school year.
Students interacted together throughout the meeting via ice breakers (created by the students); via presentations on leadership, setting goals and objectives, and giving back to the community/school through volunteering; and finally by brainstorming and planning the group’s county-wide project that they will carry out before the end of the school year.
At these meetings, students get a chance to share ideas, issues they feel are important to their school or community, and work on coming up with solutions to help abate those issues or to simply bring awareness to their peers or the community.
CCYC, created in 2009 to give students a voice in Clarion County, offers students the chance to gain hands-on leadership experience and collaborate with students across the county on a county-wide project. In addition, the students work on and carry out at least one project at their own schools and in their own communities, though some districts go beyond that requirement.
Participating schools bring four to nine students from grades 8-12 to the three county-wide meetings, which are being held this year at the Trinity Point Church of God community room, and meet weekly or monthly at their own schools. Each school is assigned a mentor from the CCYC Workgroup. This work group, consisting of different agencies in Clarion County, exists to offer insight, resources, and any help that the schools might need.
Thirty-six students from Allegheny-Clarion Valley, Clarion Area, Clarion-Limestone, Keystone, North Clarion, and Redbank Valley school districts shared their ideas for projects and issues that they are planning to address in their schools or communities. A sampling of ideas mentioned include bus driver appreciation, Stockings for Troops, Hats for Haiti (hurricane relief), Sticker Shock (underage drinking awareness), trail clean ups and topics of concern such as cancer awareness, bullying, mental health, positive messaging, and community outreach.
Students heard about the process of creating goals and objectives from a former North Clarion and Union school district administrator, Michael Moore, currently of Edward Jones Financial. Students were reminded of the importance in asking “why” and how they can apply that to their projects, encouraging them to dig deeper and solidly recognize why they are doing the projects that they are doing.
Michael Moore, of Edward Jones Financial, teaches students about creating objectives.
The final item on the agenda for the meeting was to have the students spend time choosing a cause and begin planning a county-wide project. The cause the students felt most strongly about was addressing hunger in Clarion County, though this cause may incorporate other subjects as well as the students develop their ideas. Each school will participate in a portion of the planning, and together they will bring awareness to their cause of choice in Clarion County through an event in the spring.
The next CCYC meeting will be held in December where the students will share updates on their school’s project goals, how their project plans are progressing, and once again, join together to work on the county-wide project.
Clarion County’s Promise is sponsored by the Clarion County Family Net Collaborative Board.
For more information, contact Amanda Cserr at 814-223-1590.
