Interview with Charmia Carolina - Even In My Bad Days, There's Hope

Photo Courtesy of Tina dela Rosa 

This fall, the DC Alliance of Youth Advocates turns 10! On September 26th, youth advocates, business leaders, and councilmembers will come together to celebrate the accomplishments of the past and our aspirations for the future. As a coalition, DCAYA’s story lies in the experiences of our members who make up the collective power of the alliance. Each week leading up to the 10-Year Anniversary Celebration, we will feature an interview from an advocate or young person who helped build DCAYA into the strong coalition it is today. PURCHASE TICKETS

We met Charmia Carolina when she offered to share her story for the DCAYA short video series “Youth Voices”. Charmia’s powerful presence on camera and honesty in the film brought audience members to tears when her story premiered at the DCAYA report release on disconnected young people.

Now, nearly a year later, we followed up with Charmia to see how her life has evolved after graduating from the Sasha Bruce Youthwork program.

Join Charmia and DCAYA at the 10 Year Anniversary Celebration where she will be honored  as an "Emerging Leader," for sharing her story to better the local community. 

_______________________________________________________________________

It’s been almost a year since you’ve graduated from Sasha Bruce Youthwork. How has your life changed since finishing the program? 

Going from nothing to graduating within a year and a half, graduating with a GED, getting a full-time job and keeping a full-time job, and then getting an apartment today - it’s showing me lines of maturity that I had never seen within myself, that I didn’t see happening.

I work now on the Sasha Bruce maintenance crew. This is my first job and a lot of people started to work when they were 15/16, so this means a lot because I have a lot of responsibilities. It’s also a comfortable environment. I like going to work, and it provides for me and my daughters.

What does it mean to you to be able to provide for you and your daughters?

It means everything because I went from not even being able to buy [my children] something to drink at times when they were thirsty, or when they were hungry and trying to get through those days when there wasn’t much to eat. Now, just to have a job that provides just that, it is a piece of mind. 

What is it like to now work at the program and interact with other young people who are fighting similar battles that you fought over a year ago?

Ok, prime example. I seen a boy talking about how he wanted to drop out of school the other day and I told him, “You’re here at the Sasha Bruce house and you’re thinking about dropping out of school when you’ve got nothing but good mentors here that help you study with your homework.” The boy said that he was having problems with math and cursive and didn’t want to tell anybody because he was embarrassed. I told a staff member who sat down with him and helped him, and when he was done the boy was like, “I want to go to college to play football!” I was glad that I spoke up and said something because the conversation went from he’s not going to school to thinking about going to college. I feel like my voice counts.

Also, I feel like they can relate to me. So anytime I can talk to a young person to keep them on the right track, I will, because I want them to feel the joy that I feel of accomplishing something.


Do you feel like you just needed a person to give you an opportunity?

Yes. I went through school and kept giving up, kept giving up. Within six years I tried to go back three or four times, even to GED programs and nothing really clicked. For some reason, I got into Sasha Bruce out of 300-and-something-people when they only had slots for 30. I got accepted. I was like, this is something I need to do, and if I didn’t change at that point, I felt like I would have never changed. I would have just let time go passed.


What could you say to other youth people who are struggling to get a job or to go back to school?

Don’t stop. There were a lot of obstacles. I could have woken up and said, man, I don’t feel like going in because the baby’s been crying all night. There’s a lot of things out there that are going to stop you. Just don’t stop because if you don’t stop, all you can get is success in the end.


You’ve attended a few Council hearings, testifying about year-round jobs for youth and then recently, on passing the Homeless Youth Amendment Act. What is it like to speak publicly at Council hearings and share your story?
I actually get to speak my opinion to people that can make a change within my community and express to them from a youth’s point of view how we feel, how everyday livin’ is, and what they can do to help us change it. That is a great thing to me because it means my voice means something.


What does your voice mean?

I feel like I count now. At first, I didn’t feel like my opinion mattered. Now, when I go talk to the DC Council and the Mayor, they might remember my name or at least part of my story. I feel like, if I can get them to remember me and I can get them to remember what I’m saying, it’ll stick in their minds and they’ll make a change.


What’s your vision for DC?

I want a lot of stuff to happen. I want the homelessness to stop because that’s a big thing. If you have nowhere to sleep at night, you can’t really focus on the next day or the next meal or anything of that nature. So I want the District to start with that and then help out with more jobs for people like myself who want to take the next step and are willing to work hard.

A special thank you to Charmia Carolina for being a part of the DCAYA 10 Year Anniversary Celebration. Your strength and perseverance is an inspiration for youth and advocates alike. Join Charmia and DCAYA on September 26th and support youth fulfill their bright futures.

YOUTH VOICES: Charmia Carolina

DCAYA, in partnership with Raise DC and with the support of The Community Foundation for The National Capital Region and the United Way of the National Capital Area released the report “Connecting Youth to Opportunity: Better Understanding the Needs of Disconnected Young People in Washington, DC.” The following "Youth Voices" blog and video series highlights the findings of the report.

It was a chilly November evening. My oldest daughter Jada walked quietly next to me as we made our way to the shelter. It was getting late, and I knew beds would start filling up quickly. Jada’s sister Jasmine was with my mom trying to find their own place to stay that night. As I looked down at Jada’s little hand in mine I thought about how big she’s gotten. She was five years old now, the last time we were in this situation, she was barely one.

Jada was growing in my belly during my eighth grade graduation. In the hallways, I could hear kids and teachers say comments like, “You know what she was doing on the weekends that’s why she was never around,” and they would compare me to the new MTV show Sixteen and Pregnant, pointing out that I was barely 14. I made it through eighth grade, but high school was just a summer away, and the same kids would be transferring to my new school.



The first time I was put out, was shortly after having Jada. I wanted to be with her father and my mom refused. I was 15 and he was much older. To me, the age difference didn’t seem like an issue, but my mom wouldn’t have it. One night we fought so badly that she said I couldn’t stay with her anymore, I had to find my own place to go. As it turned out, I couldn’t stay with him either.

For three nights I was homeless and it was terrible. I slept on playgrounds, on the metro, at bus stops, anywhere. I finally was taken to the Child and Family Services Agency and placed in a group home then a family, then another family. In the end, I lived in 12 homes within a year and a half. The process of a foster child is just crazy, you meet a person, and then five minutes later, you’re left alone with the person to live with and you don’t even know how it’s going to work out. Jada was with me, experiencing each situation as we bounced around DC and Maryland. We were placed back with my mom after CFSA found out I was pregnant again. I had my second child in February and by June my mom and I were evicted. Four years later, it became the same process all over again.

Jada and I walked up to the shelter, a line had already formed. By the time we got to the check-in desk, there were no more beds left and they were turning everyone away. As the sun was going down, it was getting noticeably colder. Frustrated and beginning to worry, I asked the workers at the check-in desk where we should go. They told me to head to the monuments. At least there would be light and some protection from the night. Jada and I left to find money for the metro.

Charmia Carolina is currently a trainee in the Sasha Bruce program YouthBuild and graduates on November 6th, 2013. Through YouthBuild, Charmia was hired for her first job with the non-profit Promising Futures. She mentors young girls in the Anacostia high school about the importance of making healthy life choices.

Read the report "Connecting Youth to Opportunity: Better Understanding the Needs of Disconnected Young People in Washington, DC"


For more on youth issues in DC you can FOLLOW us on Twitter, LIKE us on Facebook and VISIT us at www.dc-aya.org.

Connecting Youth to Opportunity

On October 22nd, DCAYA, in partnership with Raise DC and with the support of The Community Foundation for The National Capital Region and the United Way of the National Capital Area is releasing the report “Connecting Youth to Opportunity: Better Understanding Disconnected Young People in Washington, DC.” The following "Youth Voices" blog and video series highlights the findings of the report.



Educational attainment and formative employment experiences are crucial to lifelong stability and success. Yet, thousands of youth are struggling each and every day to complete their education and enter the labor market, too often spiraling into complete disconnection from both opportunities.

The ramifications of youth disconnection on the health and well-being of any community are profound. We know that disconnected youth face a future that is filled with risk and missed opportunity. The responsibility to address this issue and successfully reconnect all young people is a shared one.

However, we will never succeed if we operate in a vacuum and fail to acknowledge that the factors leading into disconnection and the strategies to facilitate reconnection are as varied and nuanced as the youth themselves. This makes youth input and participation in the development of solutions critical. Yet, nationally and locally, there has been a noticeable lack of attention paid to the voices of the young people we are aiming to support.





To amend this, DCAYA, in partnership with Raise DC, and with the support of The Community Foundation for The National Capital Region and the United Way of the National Capital Area, executed an extensive survey and qualitative study of currently disconnected and recently reconnected young people here in the District. Using a combination of tactics, we gained valuable insight into how youth experience and overcome barriers to school and work.

In soliciting young peoples' opinions we made a number of useful, although sometimes discouraging, discoveries. We discovered that often times, seemingly small issues like not having money for the bus are powerful barriers to young peoples' success. We confirmed what youth service professionals have known for years, that there are hundreds of potential factors that impact a young person's transition into adulthood. Lastly, we verified that despite not always having a comprehensive understanding of the complex systems that affect them and their peers, young people crave opportunities to better their futures and want to succeed. They just need help navigating the complex path to adulthood.

DCAYA and its partners will release the findings from this study on October 22nd. We invite you to investigate what young people had to say about their disconnection from school and work. We urge you to get involved in solving this citywide issue. The responsibility to facilitate reconnection is a shared one and the opportunity to change the future for thousands of young people is now.

We look forward to sharing the full findings with you on October 22nd and hope you join us in the movement to connect all youth to opportunity.

Anne Abbott is the policy analyst and author of the report “Connecting Youth to Opportunity: Better Understanding Disconnected Young People in Washington, DC.” To read the report on October 22nd, visit the DCAYA website at www.dc-aya.org and make sure to subscribe to the blog to receive updates on postings and videos related to the report.

Please feel free to share and tweet the blog series and videos with the hashtag #YouthVoices

To read more about youth issues in DC you can FOLLOW us on Twitter, LIKE us on Facebook and VISIT us at www.dc-aya.org.

Youth-Led Talks Youth Employment

The below post is from Debohnei Reed, a participant in the Sasha Bruce YouthLed Program. Youth-Led has been working with DCAYA over the past few months to accomplish their goals around creating more opportunities for young people to gain work experience beyond the Summer Youth Employment Program which only serves young people for six-weeks out of the year.

On February 11, 2013 my colleagues and I attended a meeting with Ward 8 Council Member Marion Barry. Previously Council Member Barry was the Mayor of DC. One of his largest initiatives was the creation of the Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP). For this reason we were hoping he would support us and our plan for creating youth jobs.

We prepared for our meeting by doing research on the costs of SYEP. We determined the difference in cost between serving one youth during the summer (at the SYEP wage for 16-21 year olds) and serving one youth year round. We then developed a proposal to support youth in high school and youth who are currently out of school with year round jobs. Our group decided to start with trying to add 50 year round jobs.

Members of Sasha Bruce Youth Led prepare for their
meeting with Council Member Marion Barry.

Because our meeting was on a Monday afternoon, our group went into work on a Sunday to make sure we were as ready as we needed to be to meet with Council Member Barry. Practice occurred throughout the day as we recited what we had to say and asked each other “did I sound good?” which served as a great help.The next day when we  arrived at the Wilson Building, we didn’t get seen as quickly as we thought but that also served as a help because we had more time to practice and even laugh a little. Finally we entered Council Member Barry’s office and introduced ourselves which was followed by a little story telling from the Council Member himself.

After introductions, we described our plan for year round jobs. We picked the issue of year round jobs because our group sees a lot of issues with youth unemployment in the city.We told Council Member Barry that while 14,000 youth in the summer youth employment program could be seen as a good thing,  the negative consequence of such a large number of youth is that some programs are overrun with young people and some are not providing authentic skills for youth. We also spoke on how we felt an evaluation of SYEP was needed because there is no way of knowing if job sites are providing youth workers with real job skills.  Our solution to this issue is to transition a portion of summer youth jobs into year round youth jobs. We told Council Member Barry how it would be beneficial to the community and youth because businesses would have more workers to help therefore making them run more efficiently. It would also save them money because they would not have to pay workers themselves.We also informed him on how we already had businesses that would take youth.

At the end of the meeting Council Member Barry told us that he was a big supporter of efforts to employ more young people and that he was supportive of our proposal.We were pleased with the Council Member’s comments on how he would like to see more money going into year around jobs. He also agreed with us on developing an outside evaluation system for the SYEP. In our eyes the meeting went well and our points were heard. END

Here at DCAYA, we deeply value programs like Youth Led that inspire and empower young people to make their voice heard in local government efforts to support them. Advocating not just for the community based organizations that serve youth but also for young people directly is an essential part of our mission and we welcome partnerships with our member organizations that directly infuse the youth voice into policy making. With performance oversight and the FY'14 budget process upon us this is an especially important time to support young people in this endeavor.

If you or your organization has youth who are interested in testifying before the City Council on an issue please contact our Policy Team ASAP and we are happy to help young people prepare testimony, go over the local oversight and budget process and set up meetings with Council Members.