Touchstone Youth Resource Services, Inc.

As important as money is to the sustainability of a non-profit, what gets me even more excited is the Elevate Prize’s two-year program that offers strategic marketing and media services, networking and professional development, and other supports that will enable me as its leader to take Touchstone into its next level of service. Touchstone exists to bring about change in the world by helping youth ENVISION a hopeful future, EMBRACE positive options, and ENGAGE in real steps toward a better life. The Elevate Prize’s financial and organizational supports will secure Touchstone’s ability to, not only maintain its staff and programs, but will grow and expand them.

The work of Touchstone is research-based and focuses on the social, emotional and character development of teens. I would use the training and resources gained from the Elevate Prize toward creating more partnerships that will, not only support, but further this work. I am particularly interested in a formal partnership with higher education for this purpose. Nashville is home to many colleges and universities, including Vanderbilt University. Tracking our outcomes is an important element to creating new and effective curriculum and funding in the future. The Elevate Prize would facilitate this component of Touchstone.

Two of my most important traits are I like to share, and I’m not afraid of a challenge. What I gain as a recipient of the Elevate Prize will in turn be poured into the people of our organization, as well as all those we serve. As executive director, I am rooted in the history of Touchstone, and at the same time, I’m responsible for having it poised for the future.  The ultimate purpose of Touchstone is to help teens deal with their hearts. I care deeply about people. At the request of its principal, I co-created a program for one of the 10 most dangerous schools in Tennessee which at the time had a dismal 39% graduation rate. We launched our initiative in January 2004, and by May 2007, our CiViL students from that particular school were honored by Hands on Nashville as Volunteer Group of the Year. In 2008, I was honored by HON as an Innovator of the Year for creating something that was making a vital difference in the lives of teens most people had given up on. Every city has those kids. The Elevate Prize could expand this movement far outside of Tennessee.

Every day we are losing teens to discouragement, despair, even death. While education is important in a teen’s life, research now shows that a person’s emotional quotient or EQ has even more to do with their success than their IQ. Touchstone uses mentioning, service-learning, and small groups in schools and community centers to build those EQ skills. Touchstone’s work equips youth to build their own distinctive personal assets in social and emotional competence to make our community a better place.

Not only is building socially-emotionally healthy teens with good character an important social and moral cause, it’s a financial concern, too. Research shows that every high school drop-out is estimated to cost communities $300,000 in social services like AFDC, WIC, food stamps, etc. Participants in Touchstone’s SEL initiative consistently have a 90% to 100% graduation rate. Touchstone is doing the work of keeping students engaged in school, and in healthy relationships that greatly improve the odds that they will graduate from high school and have a successful life – or even life itself. Of even greater concern for teens is suicide, which is the leading cause of death in 15 to 24 year-olds. My work is not only restorative, it’s preventative.

“I know this,” she said. ”We CAN’T get through to their heads until we help them deal with their HEART.” This was in late 2003, and these were the words of a forward-thinking newly-assigned executive principal of a failing high school. She asked us to create something to address this issue. This wasn’t about behavior, she was talking character. Back then, the programs about character were found in elementary schools. Society tends to feel by high school, it’s just too late.

Our innovative work changed all that! It uniquely combines weekly small groups, monthly service-learning projects, and quarterly enrichment opportunities in the arts and outdoor adventure. What we offer is so unexpected one student said, “Mrs. Weber, don’t call this a ‘program.’ I’ve been programmed all my life. This is different. This is a group were you’re teaching us how to love each other!” To honor the student’s insight, we call CiViL an ‘initiative,’ not a program. If there is one component that stands out in our approach, it would have to be service-learning. Our students have traveled to Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina, partnered with teens from rural Missouri, and stayed as close as their own backyard to help others. 

Touchstone’s vision is that everyone is capable of learning life-changing social, emotional and spiritual skills for making choices that result in excellent character and a healthy life. Each changed life changes the community, and changed communities change the world. No matter your race, gender, beliefs or economic status, a person can learn how to process any situation and make positive choices that will benefit all of society.

We achieve this by building positive relationships with teens in individual and small group mentoring sessions, by engaging students in helping others through service-learning, and by offering an array of enrichment experiences than broaden a teen’s life. One day after a CiViL Service project, while taking him back to his family’s apartment in one of the most notorious public housing projects in our city, a student said to me, “You know, Mrs. Weber… I never knew it would feel so good to do the right thing for a change.” He lived in a bubble where he only saw and did the wrong thing. The work I do and oversee completely changed the trajectory of that teen’s life. Today, that young man is a first-generation college graduate!