Mpls Downtown Improvement District

The Minneapolis Downtown Improvement District, Minneapolis SafeZone Collaborative and Summit Academy teamed up this fall to create an outreach initiative in downtown Minneapolis that will help promote the opportunity for young adults to work through and complete a GED program.

The initiative aims to recruit young adults for re-enrollment into the GED program offered by Summit Academy. The target audience is individuals ages 18-25 located in downtown Minneapolis. Summit Academy will outreach to 400 young adults during a four-week period ranging from November 3 through December 2 in an effort to recruit individuals for the Contextualized GED Program.

The initiative includes recruitment, outreach and enrollment efforts and includes outreach daily. Workers will be on site in Downtown Minneapolis 3 pm-7 pm.

Another initiative that was extended through the fall is MDID and Minneapolis SafeZone Collaborative’s partnership with the Youth Coordinating Board and its youth street outreach in downtown Minneapolis.

YCB will continue its outreach on Hennepin Avenue from October 28 through December 2. This organization, which aims to interrupt the behavior cycle for youth who are disruptive or disengaged downtown by connecting them to meaningful activities or resources, will continue their outreach that they provide throughout the summer months.

YCB’s youth engagement strategies include:

• Connecting youth through Go To Pass conversations
• Promoting downtown behavior expectations guidelines
• Connecting youth to opportunities in communities including programs, libraries, sporting events, employment opportunities and youth activities
• Continue to use social media R.A.G.E. page on Facebook to get youth involved and highlight great youth interactions
• Collaborate with key youth outreach partners like the Downtown 100, St. Stephen’s Homeless Street Outreach, YouthLINK, MAD DADS, MPD, MDID Ambassadors, Juxtaposition Arts, Blue Print for Action and SafeZone Security Collaborative
• Partner with the Minneapolis Central Library and Best Buy Tech Center Staff
• Bus tokens will be used by YCB Street Outreach Team to connect disengaged youth to activities, resources and home.

In 2015, YCB Street Outreach included 11,549 positive youth contacts, 200 bus tokens for youth to go places, 681 Go Pass help to students connecting through downtown, 430 social services referrals, 1,344 youth coaching and mentoring by youth outreach team and 7,765 views on the R.A.G.E. page Facebook account.