The project has recently begun filming, with initial interviews with founder Dorothy Stoneman, and key participants from the early years of YouthBuild, and the primary year-in-the-life focus has shifted from North Philadelphia to Newark, NJ, where there are exciting developments as YouthBuild Newark Executive Director Robert Clarke was recently awarded $5 million in government funding to replicate YouthBuild programs across the state of New Jersey.

We filmed at the YouthBuild 30th anniversary in Washington DC in March, where Dorothy Stoneman celebrated the ongoing work and the news from the Department of Labor that there would be a significant increase in funding to expand YouthBuild in 2009.  For background to the film, we have been filming with Dorothy Stoneman at the YouthBuild USA headquarters in Boston, and filmed interviews that explore the stories of her civil rights work with Leroy Looper, her former Harlem colleague and mentor, and his ongoing work in San Francisco.

In June, we filmed the announcement of the new funding, with Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis and Dorothy Stoneman announcing the upcoming allocation of funding for YouthBuild programs around the country.  The funding news meant good news for many more programs this year – almost two times more than were funded in 2008 – but the numbers applying were also higher, as more learn about the program, the need for YouthBuild continues to grow.  Several YouthBuild programs learn the hard news that they are not awarded DOL funding, and their operations are imperiled, as operating costs are hard to raise in the face of a full blown recession.  Dorothy rolls through calls to reassure program directors around the country that she will help to secure funding in other ways for them.  It’s a good and bad week all at once.

We recently filmed the Newark graduation, where 2009 YouthBuild participants mourned the loss of their classmate Edwin, as they celebrated their next steps into a new world of independent living; we will track a handful of the 2009 graduates to see how their lives unfold in parallel with the younger participants in the year ahead, as some may become mentors to the younger participants in an organic way through YouthBuild Newark.

Full production will begin at the start of the upcoming YouthBuild academic year, with the selection of potential YouthBuild candidates and their immersion into mental toughness training starting in mid and late August, and we will be filming the Newark and parts of the North Philadelphia mental toughness training programs.  Both groups have had significant increases in the numbers of youth applying; with no advertising or active recruitment, Newark recently received over 2000 applications for approximately 200 spots.

The film may open with a poignant scenes that illustrate the stakes these young people face.  In May 2009, a young man is gunned down and killed in Boston in a suspected gang retalitaion; at the sentencing, the judge reads the young man’s unmailed application letter to YouthBuild, filled with hope to change the path of his life.   In July, a YouthBuild Newark 2009 graduate is shot and killed one week before he is to graduate.  The news was extremely hard for the YouthBuild Newark family, as Edwin Munoz is the fourth Newark participant in the past two years who was killed before reaching the end of the program.

Over the year, the film will journey at key moments to other YouthBuild programs in North Philadelphia, Brownsville TX, Minneapolis and San Francisco, to explore how youth are transforming diverse communities while battling similar economic and personal challenges.

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Since I am in the final stages of production and into post on a feature doc (To Catch a Dollar –WT) portraying 2006 Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Grameen Bank Founder and the patron saint of all social entrepreneurs (according to Patricia Finneran Sr. Consultant for Sundance Institute) Dr. Muhammad Yunus AND the film project is a recipient of a generous grant from the Skoll Foundation (Sundance/Skoll Stories of Change) – one could say that it is quite fitting that I participate in this event. Add to that I briefly attended Oxford ten years ago (before switching up for Harvard) and have some familiarity with the University and surrounds so it is an experience I feel very comfortable and engaged in as I arrive on site. Read the entire Day 1 post>>

Read Day 2>>

Read Day 3>>

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In 2008, STORIES OF CHANGE launched a request for proposals and received more than 300 film projects filmmakers around the world interested in telling the stories of social entrepreneurs.  An advisory committee, including CNN Chief International Correspondent Christiane Amanpour, celebrated documentary filmmaker Eugene Jarecki (Why We Fight, The Trials of Henry Kissinger) and Skoll Foundation senior advancement officer Sandy Herz, made recommendations. 10 films have  been chosen, with the first films likely to be completed  as early as 2010.

On hand for the announcement were Jeff Skoll, Founder & Chairman, Skoll Foundation, Sandy Herz, Senior Advancement Office, Skoll Foundation, Ken Brecher, Executive Director, Sundance Institute, Pat Mitchell, President & CEO, The Paley Center For Media, and Cara Mertes, Director, Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program.

The five new STORIES OF CHANGE Grant Award Recipients are:

CONNECTED
Director: Jonathan Stack
Social Entrepreneur: Aloy Chife
Nigerian entrepreneur Chife is making an unrelenting effort to shrink Africa’s digital divide by bringing information technology to those who need it most.

EASY LIKE WATER
Director: Glenn Baker
Social Entrepreneur: Abul Hasanat Mohammed Rezwan
In Bangladesh, Architect Abul Hasanat Mohammed Rezwan’s solar-powered floating schools are turning the front lines of climate change into a community of learning.

TO CATCH A DOLLAR: MUHAMMAD YUNUS BANKS ON AMERICA (working title)
Director: Gayle Ferraro
Social Entrepreneur: Muhammad Yunus
Muhammad Yunus, known for developing the concept of microcredit,  reached seven and a half million poverty-stricken families in Bangladesh with his Grameen Bank. This film profiles the Nobel Prize winner’s newest location in Queens, New York, and 500 women borrowers.

SH*T!
Directors: Annika Gustafson and Phil Jandaly
Social Entrepreneurs: Various
This remarkable film shows viewers how to save the planet, save money while they do it, and have a laugh or two in the meantime.

THE REVOLUTIONARY OPTIMISTS
Directors: Maren Grainger-Monsen, Nicole Newnham
Social Entrepreneur:  Amlan Ganguly
In the slums of Calcutta, Ganguly, a lawyer turned social entrepreneur, empowers children to become “health minders” in their communities, which causes malaria and diarrhea rates to drop, and neighborhoods to transform.

“Social entrepreneurs are working on some of the biggest challenges facing humanity: from climate change, to water scarcity, to ethnic, political and socio-economic conflicts.  These visionaries have created workable solutions to tough problems, and it is critical to tell their stories, not only to inform but also to inspire,” said Sally Osberg, President and CEO of Skoll Foundation. “We are extremely pleased with the caliber of filmmaker submissions to the STORIES OF CHANGE initiative, and look forward to seeing the outcome of these unique collaborations.”

“It is truly extraordinary to be able to provide funding for these important projects in this difficult economic climate,” said Cara Mertes, Director of the Sundance Documentary Film Program. “In their optimism, integrity and intelligence, the films that are launching today reflect the deep challenges we face as a global community, tempered  with the ingenuity and commitment to effective, transformative change that social entrepreneurs exemplify.”

Speaking at the Skoll World Forum Opening Plenary, Sundance Institute Executive Director Ken Brecher said, ” Film is the medium for modern storytelling, and the power of storytelling as an agent for change is tremendous. The goal of STORIES OF CHANGE is to unite these creative forces and bring about not simply awareness but also solutions to the issues of our time.”

This is the third year Sundance Institute has participated in the Skoll World Forum. 2009 Sundance Filmmaker Fellows also participating in the Forum include Robert Kenner (FOOD, INC.), Gayle Ferraro (Muhammad Yunus’ Vision for America (WT)), Greg Barker (SERGIO), and Jon Alpert (BAGHDAD E.R.).

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The film is as much about powerful stories of rebuilding neglected neighborhoods and transforming education in America, as it is about the personal struggles to reclaim and reinvent these promising but fragile lives.

We follow the process to select the incoming class, to the official completion of the program in June 2010.  Some may graduate, some will not…  Along the way the film explores education, poverty, and the deeply emotional and revealing process – for the leaders and the students – that is a year in the life of YouthBuild.

About YouthBuild

YouthBuild is a youth and community development program that simultaneously addresses core issues facing low-income communities: housing, education, employment, crime prevention, and leadership development. In YouthBuild programs, low-income young people ages 16-24 work toward their GEDs or high school diplomas, learn job skills and serve their communities by building affordable housing for homeless and low-income people, and transform their own lives and roles in society.  All YouthBuild students are poor and many have had experience with foster care, juvenile justice, welfare, and homelessness. Participants spend 6 to 24 months in the full-time program, dividing their time between the construction site and the YouthBuild alternative school. Community- and faith-based nonprofit organizations sponsor most programs, although some are sponsored by public agencies. Each YouthBuild program raises private and public funds to support itself. Primary support comes from the U.S. Department of Labor through a dedicated federal line item.

Project Update

DOL announces funding recipients, bringing total of YouthBuild supported programs to 228.

The project has recently begun filming, with initial interviews with founder Dorothy Stoneman, and key participants from the early years of YouthBuild, and the primary year-in-the-life focus has shifted from North Philadelphia to Newark, NJ, where there are exciting developments as YouthBuild Newark Executive Director Robert Clarke was recently awarded $5 million in government funding to replicate YouthBuild programs across the state of New Jersey. Read more >>

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• Muhammad Yunus Banks on America (WT)
• The Team