Mary Brooks Green

When I founded Next Century Youth, Inc. in April, 2004, it was not necessarily a direction I had planned to journey or had even thought about. However, after many years of dealing with people issues in Human Resources within Corporate America, after witnessing the challenges of my own children – their experiences within the school system and community programs as they attempted to chart their personal educational and athletic journeys, it was then I realized that my passion and purpose was in helping youth.

With years of corporate training, I stumbled upon an opportunity with the Department of Juvenile Justice to provide transitional training for youth who were incarcerated at Eastman Youth Detention Facility, Eastman, Georgia. The weeks that I spent face to face with those youth, and the expressions and notes of those youth reaching out to me for help led me to explore how I could do more and reach other youth. As I sifted through the notes from the youth (I am still holding onto most of those letters) I began to realize that something within the family, school, community and society structure as a whole were flawed. As I reached out to the youth to learn more about their past I began to see that most of them had missed out on the sound foundation that I received as a youth, the old school value system and principles that instilled such things as know who you are and for what you stand, being a responsible person and learning to give and do for others was totally missing or perhaps buried by these youth. When I look at the numbers of youth today who have no clue who they are, where they are going, nor how to get there – and forget the fact that their limited exposure narrows their vision of opportunities – I know that I am in the right place and doing the rights things.

Since April, 2004, we have collaborated with governmental and other agencies in bringing programs to youth that not only are of interest to them, but offer the personal leadership, molding and good citizenship components with it. I use my experiences and training in dealing with people and mediation certification, and more importantly the overall ability to talk with youth where they are – on their level - to connect with them and create programs that I know they will embrace. Most all of our program ideas come from the youth directly, I just work on them so that the ideas are fashioned for acceptance by our many partners and audiences.

I have always worked with youth as far back as Raleigh, North Carolina when I served with Partners of Wake County (a big brother big sister program). I personally engage my own children with community service projects annually to instill the giving values to them, and they are now both more engaged in the business of Next Century Youth, Inc. It is so rewarding to see them voluntarily mentor other youth and come up with service projects that they want to bring to various youth and communities. I am blessed by these two beautiful children who continue to inspire and help me in persevering for this cause.

When you have a daughter tell you that the only thing she wants for Christmas is to take the money that I plan to spend on her to use for purchasing clothing and blankets for homeless in Atlanta; or to hear my son say you know this kid really has a talent for lacrosse, I would really like to mentor him, because I know he is going through many of the things I’ve personally gone through and I would like to share so he doesn’t make mistakes that I made. Now when you hear these kinds of messages from your own, you want to spread the love, and this is what we intend to do as a family unit and at Next Century Youth, Inc.

We likewise are always looking for volunteers, but are quick to recognize and only engage those who truly have a passion for the youth. My philosophy on this is simple – “I think these kids are some of the brightest around, just often misunderstood. And because they are so special, Next Century Youth, Inc. will only engage those persons/volunteers who have the same passion and interest that we do in seeing them succeed - because when people engage with the youth who are a part of our program, they will see that these youth are smart enough to know if you are for real or not, and if you have their best interest. We cannot afford to put anyone who is not serious and genuine about their success before them because we are focused on creating options for them - Our Next Century of Youth.