Neighborhood Youth Employment Program

Banner’s Neighborhood Youth Employment Program (also called Summer Youth Employment Program) gives youth in the community the chance for the some real world work experience, while instilling a sense of pride by helping to improve the physical condition of the community with beautification projects.

For the past two years, Banner has partnered with Baltimore’s YouthWorks program. Youth that live in the area, that have registered with YouthWorks, have been placed at Banner in its Summer Youth Employment Program.

The teens are hired to work 6 hours a day, 5 days per week, for a period of 6-8 weeks. During the summer, the youth work on a variety of projects, such as pruning trees, weed and trash removal from street tree pits, clearing walkways and cleaning building steps in Patterson Park, along with other community beautification activities.

Youth also participate in career/life-building fieldtrips and lectures. Past experiences include camping at Harper’s Ferry, bank visits, tours of the BG&E facilities, and conversations with various professionals who visited Banner to speak about their careers-from doctors to lawyers, to police officers to chefs.

Check out the program in the kids' own words at the Summer Youth Employment blog.