Mayor Eric Adams with a group of Summer Youth Employment Program participants Thursday at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn.
Foto:
Michael Appleton / NYC Mayoral Office
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Mayor Eric Adams kicked off this year’s Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP) this week with an event at Maimonides Hospital in Brooklyn.
Last February, the mayor announced that SYEP – which is the country’s largest youth program – would increase the number of participants from 75,000 to 100,000.
“If we want our young people to fight for a better city or a better life, we have to create better opportunities. That is the goal of this administration,” said Adams, in his speech this Thursday. “What I hear from parents is that COVID has had a devastating impact on our youth. Many of them are sitting in isolation at home. Many of them missed critical years of communication and interaction with each other. We must do everything possible to make up for lost time.”
The Mayor stated that summer youth employment will allow participants to make a difference in the future in a real way.
“What our young people need now is a future they can see. A future they can believe in and not the pessimism that COVID-19 brought to our city and our country. This year’s New York City Summer Youth Employment Program gives the youth of New York City the opportunity to learn and make a difference in the world in a historic way,” she remarked.
The mayor also recalled that people say that young people are the most valuable assets, but they have not been invested in the way they should be.
“We will show our young people that we value their talents, we value their voices, we value their experiences. That the present moment is one of opportunity. We are going to seize the moment and we are going to provide the opportunity and the skills. Too many young people have not had those opportunities,” Adams said.
Maimonides President and CEO Ken Gibbs explained that the hospital has been participating in the summer youth program for 25 years.
“We have more than 4,000 graduates of this program. We are the largest employer in Brooklyn, the largest health care provider. And we have a great commitment to this program from what we see in it, and the mayor is promoting it. It’s that we have nothing more precious than our youth, our future leadership,” Gibbs said. “And this is a path to productive working life, to the economy, to citizenship and, in this case, to health care, which is a generous profession, a caring profession.”
After thanking the Maimonides for his steadfast commitment to youth, Deputy Mayor for Strategic Initiatives Sheena Wright shared that when he joined the administration in January, the Mayor was very clear.
“I wanted to invest in our young people. The commitment to move forward was the biggest commitment I wanted this administration to make. And as we looked into the summer, we wanted to make sure that coming out of COVID-19, we had the biggest, best and biggest opportunities for young people,” she stated. “A promise was made to increase, historically, summer youth employment. And that promise has been fulfilled. And we begin, this week, to show what set that plan in motion. 100,000 youth citywide, the largest in history, and some additional opportunities and enhancements to the program.”
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