She’s with them Monday through Thursday in an LSU classroom, teaching them something new about life and about themselves. For the boys, time spent with Washington is a fun and productive extension of school. But for her, it’s much more than that.
Washington is a social worker and the program director of the Youth Empowerment Program, or YEP Village, an after-school program geared toward young African-American boys considered “at-risk” because they live in high-crime areas.
“The program was granted as violence prevention for young boys, as opposed to older ones,” Washington says. “We figured if we went with younger boys it would truly be violence prevention versus intervention, where the kids would already have been in the juvenile justice system or some type of trouble.”
Morris Johnson, 12, works on his homework at the YEP Village on LSU’s campus.
The program launched in 2013, when Washington went out to elementary schools to recruit for it. She focused on two ZIP codes with high crime rates, 70802 and 70805, and recruited from schools that serve those areas, such as Capitol Elementary School and Melrose Elementary School. Since then, she has maintained about 50 elementary and middle school boys in each program semester.
One of YEP’s largest goals is to promote self-esteem and self-empowerment. Washington and her co-workers do daily affirmations with the boys and have implemented an activity called “positive action”—designed to promote healthy decisions, peer interaction and conflict resolution—in which scenarios are presented, and the boys must establish the difference between a positive response and a negative, unproductive one.
“We really talk to the kids,” Washington says. “We teach them how to deal with things they may experience in life and make sure they’re not mimicking the things they may see in their neighborhoods.”
But that’s just one part of the after-school program. Washington also helps the boys with their homework, which they sometimes struggle with. Then, it’s time for many of the boys’ favorite part of YEP Village—physical activity. Each day, they are allowed time to play football, kickball and just about any other sport with a ball on LSU’s campus.
Trammell Williams has been in the program since the fourth grade. He’s now 12 and in sixth grade, and he has changed drastically for the better, he says.
Before YEP Village, Trammell says he got in trouble frequently at school. He assesses himself as a “talker” and as a kid who used to be somewhat disrespectful to others. But since joining YEP, he says, his demeanor has changed.
“We learn a lot here about feelings and how we should think before we act,” Trammell says. “It helps keep me out of trouble and start to be more respectful.”
Seventh-grader Joshua Robins, 13, has been in the program since fifth grade. YEP Village has helped him with math and reading skills and taught him about sportsmanship and friendship. He’s improved his grades thanks to YEP Village’s one-on-one homework help. He is also learning what self-worth is.
“I’m learning about what friendship really means,” Joshua says. “I’m learning how to see myself in a positive way.”
Maintaining positivity is not without its challenges.
From left: Trammell Williams, 12, Gregory Parker, 13, Noreon Butler, 11, Kendrick Myles, 11, and Charles Barker, 11.
Alton Sterling’s death last July rocked these boys’ world. Many of them come from Sterling’s neighborhood. Some of them knew him personally or saw him regularly. They called him “the nice man who sold CDs.”
The boys tried to understand why he was killed, Washington says. It’s a question that she and her team still can’t really answer.
What about them? the boys asked. Did their lives matter as young black boys if it seemed Alton Sterling’s life didn’t? In the aftermath, Washington has reiterated as often as she can that their lives do matter—and she never wants them to forget that.
The YEP Village program is only a three-year grant, and currently, it is in its final year and scheduled to end in July. Washington has her fingers crossed in hopes that LSU’s Office of Social Service Research and Development can find a way to continue the program through a new grant.
She’s seen her students’ grades improve, and many are now on track to enter local magnet schools.
“I think this program means everything,” Washington says. “Despite the reality that these boys may live in, we’re teaching them that they are still so worthy and there’s still so much out there for them if they just believe in themselves and give themselves a chance. There is a life outside of their community, and if you teach one boy that, they will teach another, and he’ll teach another and so on and so on.”
That type of encouragement is already having a positive effect on the boys. Sixth-grader Trammell says he never thought about career choices before he started coming to YEP Village. Now, he has dreams of becoming a video game graphic designer when he grows up. facebook.com/LSUYEPVillage
This article was originally published in the March 2017 issue of 225 Magazine.
