CYFAR New Communities Project

This afterschool program, CYFAR New Communities Project (NCP), aids youth in developing life, leadership and workforce preparation skills while they spend time with caring adults. The University of Idaho Owyhee County Extension (Extension) provides programming in partnership with the Marsing Resource Center and the Marsing School District. The Marsing Resource Center (MRC) is a community computer lab with 15 computers, ten of which have high speed Internet connection via satellite. The Marsing School District runs an afterschool program focused on providing a safe place with recreation, tutoring and homework help several afternoons per week. Extension partners with the Marsing School District and the MRC to provide technology activities at the MRC afterschool, on weekends and during the summer. The youth attend one of three days and have the option of attending on Saturdays.

CYFAR New Communities Project's goal is to bridge the digital divide and offer under served youth in low-income communities experiential learning activities that develop workforce preparation skills.

To assess the skill development we used the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, Student Technology Competencies (Idaho currently has only a draft version of technology competencies). Using the Texas benchmarks the staff accessed the youth in November and then again in May. The majority of the youth started the academic year rating a "not at all" on the benchmarks appropriate to their grade. In May 81 percent of the youth rated "some to well" on the grade appropriate benchmarks. This equates to the youth were either at grade level or above on the benchmarks. Only four youth scored lower-one at 67%, two at 59% and one at 42%. The youth participating in the typing and newsletter activities all improved their typing score. By May seven of nine youth were consistently typing "well" for their grade and two were typing at grade level most of the time.