ORANGE COUNTY YOUTH COMMISSION (2) - 2009

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Orange County Youth Commission Santa Ana, California Number of youth served: The number of youth that attend the boxing club fluctuates from 60 to over 100 with an average of 35 to 45 each day. However, we project that we will case-manage and serve 25 youth in this WIA program. They all live within inner city limit of Santa Ana; California, designated as a high crime area. Those youth who will participate under this grant are legal U.S. residents who reside in Santa Ana, California and are members of low-income families. They all presently attend the Orange County Youth Commission's (OCYC) Santa Ana Boxing Club, an after-school program that integrates academic tutoring, mentoring and other supportive activities with athletic skill development and leadership training. All of these youth require incentives to participate and some of these youth are on probation, or in foster care. Many of these youth live with relatives other than father and mother and many have only one parent. The Santa Ana Boxing Club is one of 17 after-school clubs operated by OCYC. Most clubs are located in school settings, but this one is unique in that it located in an authentic boxing club within the local community. This Program Addresses the following Elements: Element Number 1: Tutoring, study skills training, and instruction, leading to completion of secondary school, including dropout prevention strategies. We actively provide tutoring in all of our after-school clubs and, in particular, the Santa Ana Boxing Club. There is a physical area in the Club where students can utilize computers for homework. This area also serves as the tutoring area. We collaborate with Santa Ana College, Vanguard University, Biola University and other schools to place college students within the Club for tutoring. Here, they work one-on-one with youth identifying and addressing academic deficits where needed. All tutors are trained by Project Manager, Kate Medina. Kate has been the director of two different reading programs, Talking Pages and ABC Learn. For three years she had programs for these companies through the "No Child Left Behind Act". She personally has also tutored over 60 children. Kate understands that the basics of reading, writing and math need to be achieved before the child or young adult can go on to any type of further education. Each student receives apre-test to identify their current academic status and to identify areas that need improvement (reading skills, vocabulary, comprehension, basic math skills, etc.). The tutors establish an academic plan with the student to help them reach certain goals such as grades in individual classes; improving their overall GPA. They discuss steps to reach those goals and monitor progress toward that goal. A major incentive for youth to focus on homework and academics is that it is the key to boxing team membership. Boxing team membership serves as incentive to raise grades. In turn, the higher GPA becomes an intrinsic incentive. Our unique 3