October 2002

"First we create the movement, then we raise the money."

This, in shorthand, is Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick's approach to Mayor's Time, his commitment to dramatically expand the number of Detroit children enrolled in after-school activities. Mayor Kilpatrick made the remarks at the September 28 Mayor's Time launch and after-school fair.

How's the movement going? Judging by the participation in the fair, it's well underway: 15,000 parents and children attended in order to learn about, and register for, after-school opportunities sponsored by the nearly 250 after-school programs that were on display at the fair.

The Youth Connection worked with the Mayor's office to produce the Mayor's Time launch. Dr. Grenaé Dudley, executive director of The Youth Connection (TYC) http://www.theyouthconnection.org/ , is on loan to the Mayor's office to direct Mayor's Time.

In the past four years, The Youth Connection has focused its efforts on creating an environment where participation levels in after-school programs will reach 50 percent of the youth in Detroit, Pontiac and Mt. Clemens.

When Kilpatrick was elected mayor last year and made after school programming a key platform of his administration (dubbing it Mayor's Time), the opportunity for a strategic partnership was created: TYC provides the infrastructure and organizational skills to launch Mayor's Time and to identify the policy changes, resources and strategies to expand after-school opportunities; the Mayor and his staff provide the political savvy and clout necessary to obtain funding needed to attain the 50 percent participation rate, a goal also adopted by Mayor's Time.

After researching current participation rates and average per-child costs for after-school programs, TYC set a funding goal of $70 million in new or redistributed annual investment in after-school programming annually by 2005 for Detroit and $4 million for the other cities, Mt. Clemens and Pontiac, in which it operates. To achieve this, TYC developed the After-School Investment Strategy. The strategy is a multi-year funding plan that identifies realistic funding sources from all sectors (federal, state, county, city, school districts and private) and details strategies to tap them.

An example of the investment strategy in action is a current effort to ensure that Detroit receives at least a proportionate share (which it historically has not) of the federally funded after-school program 21st Century Community Learning Centers. The Youth Connection is part of a coalition - including Detroit Public Schools, City Connect, Communities in School and Detroit Youth Sports and Recreation Commission - that is working with the Michigan Department of Education on this.

Mayor's Time and TYC are working on a unified information and communication strategy to make sure the community understands the value of after-school activities and knows how to access them. An example of this is the after-school fair mentioned above. Another is a brand-new website, called Mayor's Time After-school Location Finder. The website provides information (phone numbers, contact names, bus routes to the activity, times and days the activity is offered, and more). The website also describes how a program involves the six core areas of childhood development identified by Mayor's Time: enrichment, culture, social, technology, recreation and environment.

Another joint communications activity will be advertising. Mayor's Time will be integrated into TYC's ongoing "Participate 3 to 8" advertising campaign that involves TV ads, bus boards, billboards and other media. This ad campaign has been promoting to the entire community the benefits of having programs and activities for kids during the hours of 3 to 8 p.m. Several partners, such as Channel 7, the local ABC affiliate, help fund the ad campaign.

Together, The Youth Connection and Mayor's Time are working to make Detroit a city full of continuous, creative, interactive and fun learning opportunities for our children.

For more information on this website about The Youth Connection, click here. For more information on this website about after-school programs, click here.