Serving At-Risk Youth in Mesa, Arizona

In our work with the Accent on Student Success: Engaged Together in Service (ASSETS) grant, Mesa Community College (MCC) has served at‐risk youth in a number of capacities. We began our work in partnership with the Achieving a College Education (ACE) program at MCC. ACE students are dual enrolled high school and college students. As at‐risk youth themselves, these students collaborated with the Center for Service‐Learning in various service-learning projects. In proceeding years, we focused on partnering with faculty in various disciplines to design service-learning projects with community partners that serve at‐risk youth. We have worked with faculty in disciplines ranging from Sociology to Recreation to Communication to Art. Each faculty member has created an original syllabus and service-learning project to fit their course objective and engage their students in service with at‐risk youth in the community. During our final year with ASSETS, we implemented a student leadership program that we named the Mesa Community College Community Strengthening Allies. Students serving as Allies enrolled in independent module service-learning classes and chose agency partners to work with for their year‐long term of service. As Allies, students have acted as liaisons for partners who serve at‐risk youth. Their goal has been to recruit additional student volunteers to serve at their host agencies. [author]