By Global Youth Leadership Institute | Executive Director
Greetings friends and family! We hope this holiday season finds you well. The Global Youth Leadership Institute has had an exciting last few months and we wanted to share the wonderful news and updates with all of you!
GYLI attends the Beyond Sport Summit held in Chicago September 27th - October 1st
This past summer GYLI's Step It Up! project was nominated for the prestigious Best New Project Award by Beyond Sport, a global organization that promotes, develops, and funds the use of sport to create positive social change across the world. Social innovators from around the world gathered at the Palmer House Hilton Hotel in downtown Chicago to discuss, celebrate, and encourage solutions to the world’s most challenging problems through the use of sport. As one of the short-listed nominees, we had the opportunity to participate in workshops, engage in meaningful dialogue, and build some really amazing relationships with like-minded individuals also trying to create social change through the use of sport. While we did not win the award, it was exhilarating to see and hear sporting legends such as Jackie Joyner Kersee, Michael Johnson, and Ethan Thorpe share about their lives beyond sports. It was inspiring to hear notable speakers such as Lonnie Ali, wife of boxing legend Muhammad Ali, Senator Bill Bradley, Mayor Richard Daley, and Prince Faisal Al Hussein express the importance of global peace, giving back, and the power of sports to create social change. And most importantly, it was humbling to meet so many individuals working at the grassroots level to create change they see as a necessary step towards creating a better tomorrow. The conference was truly a wonderful experience and we were very excited to find out that we have been invited to next year's conference in South Africa!
GYLI's Step Team for Social Justice inspires communities across New York City!
College Board Leadership Conference
The Step Team for Social Justice performed at the College Board Leadership Conference, inspiring the audience through dance and spoken word, and spreading messages of the importance of individual contribution and achieving your dreams.
Collegiate Church Corporation
The Step Team presented the "confirmation to office" at the ordination of their citiwide elders and deacons.
* The Step Team is looking for new members and will be holding open rehearsals starting in January. If youth are interested, they may contact us by email at info@liveleadershipnow.org or by calling us at 1-800-837-5532.
What are youth saying about our programs?
"After our group members began to experience certain types of gender discrimination in their own schools, we realized that our target would be youth in middle school and high school. We started instructing youth workshops with a personalized performance catered to our cause in order for other children and youth to feel comfortable being around themselves around their peers. After each workshop, we asked what each person learned and everyone always seemed to understand the point of it and its importance to how we live today. The biggest accomplishment was seeing that the people reached out to understand the importance of this subject and that they were still talking about it days and weeks after we spoke to them. Another accomplishment is how close we were drawn together as a group and how much time, energy, and effort we put into our cause to see it come to life. We were able to enjoy the ups as well as the downs of this project. It has been a rewarding experience to say the least. ~ youth participants
GYLI sincerely thanks you for your ongoing support and encouragement.
We would again like to express a heartfelt thanks to all of you who have donated, volunteered your time, and supported us this year. We are extremely lucky to be doing what we are passionate about and cannot thank you all enough for your continued encouragement and support. As we look forward to another exciting year, we want to wish all of you a very happy holiday and wonderful new year - and just a note, in case you get tired of buying the typical holiday gifts, remember that you can give a Global Giving gift card which allows the recipient to donate to one or more of the wonderful organizations (including ours) doing amazing work featured on the Global Giving website.
Cheers,
The Global Youth Leadership Institute
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