Learn more about the Connecticut Opportunity Project and its grantee partner organizations through media coverage below.
Watch grantee partner COMPASS Youth Collaborative's CEO, Jaquelyn Santiago Nazario, speak with Silver Linings Talk Show on Valley Shore Community Television in an inspiring conversation about her life in Hartford, her servant leadership mindset, and how COMPASS is transforming lives of young people through hospital violence intervention and street outreach programs.
In this op-ed, CTOP Portfolio Director, Amanda Olberg, highlights the data in additional analysis done by Boston Consulting Group showing young people’s wages at 22 can be linked to various risk factors and their previous educational attainment. Young people who are disconnected need intensive supports provided by community-based organizations to help them reconnect to education and employment pathways.
The Commission on Community Gun Violence Intervention and Prevention found that Black males in Connecticut were about 30 times more likely to be killed by gun violence in comparison to White residents from 2020-2023. The findings demonstrate a need for violence reduction organizations, like COMPASS Youth Collaborative, Roca, CTVIP, and Catalyst CT.
Mayor Arulampalam of Hartford responds to residents concerns about Hartford Public Schools by launching the Blue Ribbon Commission to address challenges. The Commission will be led by three co-chairs, including Hector Rivera, CEO of CTOP Grantee Partner, Our Piece of the Pie. The commission aims to pinpoint issues, develop recommendations, and craft a report for the mayor and Hartford Board of Education.
COMPASS Youth Collaborative, a CTOP grantee partner, provides patients admitted to Hartford hospitals with gun-related injuries with wraparound services during their hospital stay and afterwards, as well as supporting their families. Read more about how COMPASS is reducing gun violence recidivism in Hartford.
Stamford mayor, Caroline Simmons, announced the creation of the Stamford Parks Community Partnership, which will beautify parks across the city. The initiative will leverage the DomusWorks program, a workforce readiness initiative of CTOP grantee partner, Domus Kids, that provides job training and subsidized employment for program participants. Read more about the partnership.
The final report of the Connecticut's Unspoken Crisis report series includes the voices of many of the 74 young people interviewed for the project. It will reveal their challenges, the obstacles they face and the ways they have overcome them. Read more about the systems that are causing challenges for Connecticut's at-risk young people.
Gun violence suffered by Latinos in the U.S. has increased. Survivors often face a difficult road ahead that includes medical bills and accessing mental health resources. Read more about COMPASS Youth Collaborative Peacebuilder, Diego López's experience, and how he builds transformational relationships with young people to help them down a better path.
Senior Portfolio Director, Adhlere Coffy, highlights the obstacles facing young people in Connecticut who are experiencing or at risk of experiencing disconnection, and how this data can be used to inform positive change.
COMPASS Youth Collaborative CEO, Jacquelyn Santiago Nazario, was named one of Connecticut’s Top 25 Women in Business for 2024 by the Hartford Business Journal. Read her interview about her career and accomplishments.
Connecticut has a moral and economic imperative to get 119,000 at-risk and disconnected young people back on track. This group of young people can help fill 94,000 job openings in our state and bring in additional tax revenue to Connecticut.
Joshua Brown reflects on the impact that Domus Kids had on his life. He now works with Domus to re-engage at-risk and disconnected young people by providing them with the skills and resources to be self-sufficient. Now tri-chair of the 119k Commission, Brown strives to make systemic change to improve the lives of young people in Stamford. Read to learn more about Joshua's story.
Adhlere Coffy and Amanda Olberg, senior portfolio directors at CTOP, discuss how capacity building and improving nonprofit organizations can address Connecticut's Unspoken Crisis and help get young people back on track. Read more from their op-ed.
In this op-ed, Jackie Santiago Nazario, CEO of COMPASS Youth Collaborative, discusses her organization's relentless support to re-engage off-track and disconnected young people in Hartford. COMPASS helps young people develop key skills to be ready and willing to work and transform their lives, bridging a critical gap identified in Connecticut's Unspoken Crisis.
Mike Duggan, Executive Director of CTOP Grantee Partner, Domus Kids, writes an op-ed that calls attention to the crisis young people in Connecticut are facing. With 119,000 young people off-track or disconnected, there is a moral and economic imperative to help get young people in the state back on track through organizations like Domus.
Co-CEO of Dalio Education, Andrew Ferguson, speaks on Connecticut Public Radio's show, "Disrupted," about Connecticut's Unspoken Crisis, the recent report showing that 1 in 5 young people in Connecticut are at-risk or disconnected from prosocial institutions. The second half of the broadcast includes interviews with young people in Connecticut who got back on track through partnerships with CTOP grantee partners, Domus and Our Piece of the Pie.
The "Love Hartford Benefit Dinner" raised money for the Hartford Youth Service Corps, a program that supports young people (ages 16-24) in Hartford who are disconnected from work and school. The initiative was started by Mayor Luke Bronin's office and administered by CTOP grantee, Our Piece of the Pie (OPP). The benefit's fundraising efforts will support OPP in supporting 500 youth next year in the Youth Service Corps.
CTOP grantee partner, Connecticut Violence Intervention and Prevention, was one of seven organizations awarded a three-year grant from the state Department of Public Health. With this new funding, CTVIP will begin serving teenage girls in New Haven through the MakeHerSpace program. Other CTOP Grantees were also awarded the same grant, including Compass Youth Collaborative and Roca in Hartford.
Byron Pitts from ABC News' Nightline reports on the growing truancy crisis in American schools. In the video piece, he travels to Hartford, CT and follows Peacebuilders from COMPASS Youth Collaborative on a ride along and interviews program participants to understand the impact the program has on Hartford youth. Watch the piece here and learn what COMPASS Peacebuilders are doing to combat truancy and community violence.
Roca Young Mothers program recently expanded to Hartford, CT, seeking to address community violence by supporting women who get caught up in it. To mark its two-year anniversary, Roca issued a report summarizing its work and the women who have utilized its services, including a panel discussion of the organization's impact on the Hartford community. Read about Roca's impact on young women in the Capitol region.
Connecticut Conference of Municipalities gathered leaders in education, nonprofits, and business to discuss Connecticut's Unspoken Crisis. Executive Directors from two CTOP grantee partners, Forge City Works and Catalyst CT (formerly RYASAP), weighed in on the problem of disconnection in CT and offered their perspectives on how to address it.
Connecticut Conference of Municipalities hosted a round table to discuss the findings of Connecticut's Unspoken Crisis, a quantitative research study commissioned by Dalio Education. Executive Directors of Forge City Works and Our Piece of the Pie (OPP) weigh in on their work with disconnected youth and how to improve their outcomes.
Watch the Connecticut Conference on Municipalities round tables discussing the findings of Connecticut's Unspoken Crisis, a quantitative research report on disconnected youth in the state, commissioned by Dalio Education. Representatives from Connecticut Opportunity Project grantee partners participated on the panels and highlighted their efforts to re-engage disconnected youth and offered their perspectives on what needs to be done to address this crisis.
A recent report by Boston Consulting Group, commissioned by Dalio Education, reveals that 63,000 young people in Connecticut are disconnected from work and/or school. Hear from a young person enrolled in Compass Youth Collaborative, a grantee partner of the CT Opportunity Project, explaining the impacts the program has had on his life trajectory after reconnecting him to the Hartford community.
Domus Youth Service Corps is part of a program of CTOP grantee partner, Domus Kids, where participants learn life and trade skills to reconnect to their community and get on a career path. Read more about how Domus has partnered with the City of Stamford to spruce up High Ridge Road, while employing young people and helping them learn key life skills.
In wake of teen’s shooting death, Hartford activists, educators say city needs to work together to end cycles of violence. Ayelet Chozick, director of organizational advancement at the Compass Youth Collaborative, agreed that teens and young adults in the city are overcoming lifetimes of fear and trauma caused by witnessing and hearing shootings and losing friends and family to gun violence.
This program, the Summer Youth Employment and Learning Program, works to connect youth in the Hartford region with paid summer jobs. Facilitated by Our Piece of the Pie (OPP), a CTOP grantee partner, the program gives young people the opportunity to earn a paycheck and learn skills that are necessary for college and career success.
COMPASS Youth Collaborative, a CTOP grantee partner, led by CEO Jackie Santiago Nazario (Trinity College '00), builds transformative relationships with young people in Hartford. COMPASS's work aims to reduce violence and help young people at the center of violence to break the cycle and get themselves on a path to self-sufficiency. Read this article in the Trinity Reporter to learn more about Jackie and COMPASS's work in Hartford.
Jacquelyn Santiago Nazario, CEO of CTOP grantee partner, COMPASS Youth Collaborative in Hartford, which works to deter gun violence by providing mentorship and after-school activities for at-risk youth, said she also believed the community conversations would have a positive impact in reducing violence in Hartford. Learn more about the bill and COMPASS's work.
Investing public and private funding in programs supporting Opportunity Youth is essential for promoting economic growth and social equity and for preparing the next generation of workers for a rapidly changing job market.
