Save SYEP

April 6, 2020 — July 1, 2020

Result: Partial Win

After eliminating all funding for the Summer Youth Employment Program in April, Mayor de Blasio and the City Council reached an agreement to restore 35,000 positions for Summer 2020. This is a significant drop from the 75,000 SYEP slots last summer, but it’s better than a complete elimination, which would have been catastrophic. To ensure that youth voices are better represented in future decision making, we are in the early stages of an agreement with the Department of Youth and Community Development to create a youth task force that will advise city officials on SYEP and other youth programming.

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WE DEMAND THAT MAYOR DE BLASIO REVERSE HIS DECISION ON THE SUMMER YOUTH EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM AND RESTORE ALL 75,000 PLACEMENTS!

New York City’s Summer Youth Employment Program Must Be Restored — Teen Vogue (op-ed by La’Toya Beecham)

A Message To Mayor Bill de Blasio: Save Our Summer Youth Employment Program — Gothamist (op-ed by Ishrat Jahan)

Mayor, restore the Summer Youth Employment Program — NY Daily News (op-ed by Tiffani Torres & Sophie Mode)

Mayor De Blasio: Restore Funding to Summer Youth Employment for Teens Who Need It, Like Me — Gotham Gazette (op-ed by Karleny Ramos)

Op-Ed: NYC Teens Can be Part of the Healing Process This Summer — Norwood News (op-ed by Ndeye Thioubou)

NYC’s summer jobs program changed my life. Don’t cancel it now. — Chalkbeat NY (op-ed by Cristian Flores)

All the Reasons This Will Be a Bleak Summer for N.Y.C. Children — The New York Times (feat. La’Toya Beecham & Sue Najm)

Students Wanted to Ask NYC Mayor de Blasio Directly How he Plans to Create Summer Jobs For Students After Cutting Program. After 66 Calls, One Got Through — The 74 (feat. Lennox Thomas)

Why Proposed Budget Cuts May Hit Young People Hard This Summer — NY1 (feat. LaToya Beecham & Kai-Lin Kwek-Rupp)

What will summer in NYC look like for kids? Camps, pools, and other programs face cuts — Chalkbeat NY (feat. Marlen Mendieta-Camaron)

Student Activist Group Out To Save NYC’s Summer Youth Employment Program — CBS2 (feat. Sue Najm, La’Toya Beecham & Stephanie Pacheco)

NYC Summer Youth Employment Programs cut due to coronavirus — FOX5 (feat. La’Toya Beecham)

NYU Community Members Demand NYC Education Reform Amid COVID-19 — Washington Square News (feat. Lorraie Forbes & Kimberly Martinez)

NYC cuts 75,000 summer jobs for youth amid coronavirus fallout — Chalkbeat NY (feat. Sue Najm)

What SYEP Means to Me — Medium (post from Teens Take Charge)

Inside the push to protect the Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP) — Medium

Teen Advocates Fight to Save Summer Jobs — Youth Communication (feat. Sophie Mode)

CITY COUNCIL TRACKER

BACKGROUND

The city announced on April 7, 2020 that it will eliminate the Summer Youth Employment Program, a $164 million program that provides jobs to 75,000 young people every summer. Given the tremendous financial strain on hundreds of thousands of low-income New York City families right now, we should be expanding paid summer opportunities, not cutting them.

We, along with thousands of other students across NYC, are fighting back against this heartless decision.

OUR ARGUMENT

• Extreme segregation in the NYC school system creates massive disparities in students’ lives in and out of school. Programs like SYEP help reduce the gaps in work-based learning and social capital that segregation creates.

• Families around the city are in financial crisis. A paid summer job for a young person helps the whole family.

• If we can shift a 1.1 million student school system to remote learning in a week, we can certainly find a way (IF NEEDED) to offer meaningful remote summer jobs or career training to a fraction of that number of young people in 3 months. Providers have assured us that they already have contingency plans in the works.

• After a LONG spring of remote learning, New York City teens are more in need than ever of ways to stay meaningfully engaged and, if necessary, indoors, this summer.

• SYEP is an amazing program! Young people have called it “life changing.” Losing it now, in a time of crisis, will be detrimental to young people’s mental health.