July/August 2015
Dear Friends of The Hope Center:

By now, most of you know the sobering statistics about young people aging out of foster care.  Almost 40% will be homeless at some point by their 21st birthday.  Half will be consistently unemployed.  Less than 10% will attend college. 
 
Most young people come to The Hope Center in crisis and on the verge of becoming one of these statistics. But this summer we had the opportunity to help young people aging out of foster care beat these odds. Through a unique internship program funded and supported by The Jamie Kirk Hahn Foundation, The United Way of the Greater Triangle and Wake County Human Services, young people who will soon age out had the opportunity to participate in a paid, supportive internship at a non-profit organization.
 
Not only did we want to give our young people a real job experience that taught them important work skills, we also wanted to give our young people an opportunity to realize that they too can be leaders of change in our community. Our goal at The Hope Center isn't just to prevent our young people from being homeless or being unemployed. Our ultimate goal is to empower our young people to realize all of their dreams and to find a way to leave this community just a little bit better than they found it.
 
We are grateful to have a group of supporters such as yourself who understand that this is a much bigger journey than just making sure everyone has a roof over their head or food on their table.   Thank you for believing in the work we do and most importantly for believing that these young people deserve the opportunity to do much more with their lives than just beat a statistic.


Stacy Bluth
Executive Director
The Hope Center
Fourteen of our young people participated in internships this summer. Undoubtedly these internships were invaluable in helping our young people prepare themselves for future job opportunities. They were exposed to all the in's and out's of employment, including how to write a resume, opening a savings account, how to navigate the bus system to get to and from work, how to budget, and what to wear to job interviews as well as on the job. They even learned about taxes (much to the surprise of some of our young people!). We got to celebrate our young people's successes at our first annual internship gathering where participants and non-profit partners alike all came together to celebrate the conclusion of the 10 week summer internship program. 
  

Highlight: Intern

Angie, who aged out of foster care last year and who is currently a student at NCCU, absolutely loves animals. In fact, she rescued baby bunnies when she was younger, and so when the opportunity came for her to intern at the SPCA of Wake County, she jumped on it. As an intern, Angie helped take care of the animals at the shelter, and also served as an adoption counselor, helping to find permanent homes for the animals at SPCA. (Yes, this parallel between Angie's experience in foster care and the animals in care is not lost on us). The internship experience proved to be a huge milestone for Angie, who, as a relatively shy and reserved person, learned to be more personable and come out of her shell a bit more, especially when working with others to get the animals adopted. "I loved being around animals such as dogs, kittens, bunnies, and the interaction with people" said Angie. And, as a result of her summer's effort, she has decided to change her major to social work, and we look forward to supporting her as she works towards this goal. 
New launch site! New routes! We hope you can join us for this year's Cycle for Hope. We are looking for sponsors, volunteers, and riders, so please click here to find out more information and to register. 




Where To
Find Us

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Donate
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We are always in need of items on our wish list to help our young people as they set up their apartments.  For a complete list, click here.
 
 
Volunteer
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 We are always looking for volunteer mentors and tutors for our young people.  Click here to find out more information about how to get involved.
 
 
Contribute
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Donations of any amount help sustain the work we do with young men and women aging out of foster care.  Click here to find out more!
 
 

Our thanks to the non-profit organizations who sponsored internships:

Artopia
Artspace
CAM Raleigh
Food Bank of Central and Eastern NC 
The Green Chair Project
Inter-faith Food Shuttle
Neighbor to Neighbor Outreach
North Carolina Theatre Conservatory
SPCA of Wake County
Tammy Lynn Center for Developmental Disabilities
Urban Ministries of Wake County

Special thanks to Bad Daddy's of Seaboard Station for providing a delicious array of food at the internship celebration.
| | [email protected] |
1801 Hillsborough Street
Raleigh, NC 27605