This is a FREE luncheon for anyone in the community to learn more about what we are doing and support the incredible work we are doing in El Paso County! We are kicking off our Capital Campaign this year! Our goal is to raise $2.5 million to purchase a building for our "Forge Teen Center." The Forge Teen Center will be a one-of-a-kind community space that will provide young people ages 10-19 with a centralized hub across the Colorado Springs area to create community.
This space will be the first of its kind as a teen drop-in center for all youth regardless of identifiers, labels, and assumptions. Currently there is no place or program like this for teens in the Pikes Peak region. It will provide access to resiliency building skills, mental health resources, substance use support, prevention and intervention while helping them to strive for a successful future.
Forge Evolution works with at-risk youth ages 10 to 19 of which 70% come from low-income families.
The Forge Evolution program targets youth involved in early trauma or at-risk behaviors like abandonment of a parent, poverty, neglect, abuse, academic struggles, etc., with an understanding these incidents can occur at any point in a youth or child's life. Prior to the establishment of Forge Evolution, the Teen Court programming delivered this in the "response" or "transition" stage, after a crime occurred. These provisions of legal services and alternative to the traditional court system will continue, but the new programming opens new pathways. We started a FREE weekly drop in program for youth in our community offering various topics each week. Some of our partners are The Space Foundation, Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, Bemis Art School etc. It is a safe space for them and we make sure they have dinner before going home.
We will continue to offer our Teen Court program, helping kids aged 10-19 overcome misdemeanor offenses that landed them in the judicial system.
Generous sponsors:
ANB Bank