Organizational History

DuAnne Redus founded the non-profit organization, LifeWorks Institute, in Utah in 1992. The underlying question,  'what does a healthy, thriving community look like?' seeded the vision.  Her intention was to find ways to give back to her community. The first project involved raising corporate money, then recruiting corporate women to volunteer their time as mentors to help women get off welfare and to become self-sufficient. A year later 99% of the women remained self-sufficient. LifeWorks Institute then turned its focus to job training for youth and taught life skills classes funded by the JTPA Federal Program. Redus began to envision projects that were purely prevention based.

In 2001, a family crisis brought Redus and the LifeWorks Institute home to the growing community of Austin, Texas. The organizational focus on prevention looked at ways to create happy, healthy and thriving youth among the economically disadvantaged population.

That same year LifeWorks Institute was approved as an ongoing 501 c (3) status, Tax ID 87-0498737. As part of the city wide Youth Advisory Group, the organization saw the need for prevention at the middle-school level. Researching the statistics of the Texas Youth Commission and the Juvenile Justice System, Lifeworks Institute has narrowed its focus to prevention programs starting with middle-school youth.

In 2003, LifeWorks Institute received a total of $80,000 in grants. Sources included a vendor to the Texas Workforce Commission for a summer camp, Mississippi State University for a smoking/alcohol after-school prevention program, and Title IV federal funds as a service-learning partner with the Alternative Learning Center to assist youth in building an on-campus greenhouse which carried over through May, 2005.

The vision of developing a mentoring program was funded by a local foundation, and a successful mentor training pilot program was administered with high school youth (September, 2003- May, 2004).

In 2005 the name of the organization was changed to Youth Taking Charge (YTC) to more accurately reflect the organization's strategic focus.   The current focus for youth is in the Wimberley Valley.

 

Provide a youth zone facility that provides youth in the Wimberley Valley year-round programs and activities that revolve around essential lessons that nurture potential and integrate experiences of art, music, dance, martial arts, ecology and mentored self-development and group interaction.


 

YTC collaborates and provides a safe container for youth in the Wimberley Valley to have fun and make healthy life decisions.

YTC:

• Provides personal development and recreational programs beginning with youth who have completed third grade.
• Provides consistent service, education and support for youth who stay in the program for 3+ years
• Offers hands-on entrepreneurial business training in a real business, strengths-based service learning and job shadowing with mentors
• Seeks to fund these programs partially through a self-sustainable business making the organization less dependent on annual grants and donations other than those required to maintain our current non-profit status.

YTC collaborates with Communities in Schools and other agencies who make referrals to the program. (http://www.youthtakingcharge.org/alliancePartners.asp) Mentors come from local colleges with students who are studying related fields of education, psychology, social work and business.

Results of YTC Programming and Projects:

• More youth are served through consistent, long-term programs
• Risk is reduced for youth to enter the juvenile justice system
• More youths are better prepared for transitions to successful high school experiences
• More youth learn to fish for a lifetime as a prevention strategy
• More healthy choices for youths to thrive.