Chinatown Beautification Day and Youth Conference
DESCRIPTION
Chinatown Beautification Day (CBD) seeks to instill environmental awareness among members of the community to create a collective conscientiousness about environmental hygiene. To build upon the momentum of CBD, CYI launched a Citywide Youth Conference to further cultivate youth leadership. The Youth Conference complements CBD by discussing the various facets of leadership and community involvement in a broader context. The Cleanup Day following the conference is the physical manifestation of youth leadership and involvement.
HISTORY
Chinatown Beautification Day began as a project created by CYI’s 2003 Summer Leadership Institute. The main motivation was to address concerns that Manhattan’s Lower East Side had become neglected in the aftermath of 9/11. Since 2003, CYI has held CBD annually, consistently gathering between 150 and 350 high school youth to clean the streets of Chinatown. In 2009, CBD was expanded to include the Citywide Youth Conference, which preceded CBD in the same weekend. At the conference, youth attended workshops on a variety of issues, including mental health, women’s empowerment, hip hop as a tool for social justice, and cultural identity.
VALUES
Our goals for the 2010 weekend
include:
· To raise awareness about the lack of resources that is available to clean Chinatown and the Lower East Side areas
· To encourage high school students to make a difference in the community
· To encourage youth to explore and discuss community issues, meet inspiring leaders and learn skills to take action and leadership in the community.
LEADERSHIP
Candice Uy, Program Advisor. Candice is an NYU alumna and is an advisor for the CBD weekend. She has volunteered with the Asian Pacific American Youth Alliance (APAYA) in the past and is excited to be part of CBD.
Ivan Yeung, Program Coordinator. Ivan is a rising junior at State University of New York at Binghamton studying Economics. He begun as a participant of CBD ’09 and is thrilled to help coordinate this year. He is also excited to see CYI grow and knows that the sky is the limit for CYI.
Ling Z. Ye, Program Coordinator. Ling is a recent graduate at St. John's University and she is preparing to begin her study of law at the New York Law School in Fall 2010. She has been involved with CYI since her junior year of high school in the summer of 2005. She was a CLP coordinator during its pilot year in 2006 and she was coordinator of CBD in the summer of 2006. Ling is excited to be back as a CBD coordinator this summer.
Lijin Chen, Program Coordinator. Lijin is a rising senior in Stuyvesant High School. He came to New York from China after finishing elementary school. He started participating in CYI's CLP program since sophomore year. He enjoys the experience and cherishes what he learned from the program. This year, as a CBD coordinator, he will do all he can to make this the best year.
OUTCOMES
All our participation is youth-led. Outreach efforts include creating materials and distributing them at various community institutions, such as libraries, the Museum of the Chinese in the Americas, Charles B. Wang Community Health Center Teen Resource Center, and the YMCA.
Participation for both the 2009 Conference and the CBD was successful. Over 75 participants attended the conference and over 170 participants participated in the clean-up the following day. CBD is regularly covered by local newspapers, including World Journal, Sing Tao, China Press, and the Downtown Press. Sinovision covered the event as well.
GET INVOLVED
There are many capacities for involvement. CBD is currently seeking potential guest speakers and workshop facilitators for its 2010 Conference, August 14 – August 15th. We are also actively seeking any youth who would like to attend the Conference and/or cleanup day. Finally, we would appreciate any financial and/or in-kind donations to help us keep this event free for all participants.
DESIGN: We need a T-Shirt for each of our participants, so that we can show our spirit and determination. If you are a creative person, we would love to receive designs from you. ou may use various shirt design website or drawing software. You can also draw it by hand. You may click here to view last year’s design. Please submit your design to cbd@cyinyc.org by July 12th. Here are a few things to remember:
- - the design should have something that represents our organization (i.e. CYI)
- - the design should have something that represents the event (i.e. CBD)
- - the design should have our theme of the year (i.e. “Our Town, Our Time, Our Campaign)
- - please use lighter color for the shirt, considering the possible warm temperature of the cleanup day
- - you only need to design the front of the shirt
- - make it funny, interesting, lovely, and appropriate
FACILITATE WORKSHOP: Most of our workshops will be conducted by experts from supporting organizations. However, we want to open workshop submission to everybody this year. So if you have great workshops in mind, please submit by completing the workshop submission form. If you have any questions or want to give us further information, please send an email to cbd@cyinyc.org. The deadline is Wednesday, July 12th. Here are a few things to remember:
- - the workshop should be directed toward youths
- - the content of the workshop should be age appropriate
- - the length of the workshop will be approximately one and a half hour long
- - the topic is not restricted, it could relate to identity, environment, leadership, community, sexuality, health, ethnicity, education, or any other area
- - facilitators with past experience are preferred
- - facilitators will be provided, by default, with papers, pens, large post-it pads; printouts need to be provided by facilitators
- - make it interesting
Date and Location:
Youth Conference: Saturday, August 14th, in Woolworth Building (233 Broadway, New York, NY)
Chinatown Cleanup: Sunday, August 15th, in New York Chinese Community Center (62 Mott Street, New York, NY)
