FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Monday, July 18, 2011

FOR ASSIGNMENT: Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Contacts: Brice Freeman, Communications, 410-396-1910, bfreeman@oedworks.com Kate Schmelyun, Communications, 410-599-8626, kschmelyun@oedworks.com Ernest Dorsey, Youth Services, 410-396-6722, edorsey@oedworks.com

Seventy Young Adults to Graduate From Baltimore City’s Youth Opportunity (YO!) Program July 20 The YO! Academy and YO! centers serve youth who have not been successful in traditional school environments Baltimore, Maryland (July 18, 2011) WHAT: The Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Employment Development’s Youth Opportunity (YO! Baltimore) division will host a special graduation event for the 2011 class of 70 young adults who chose to pursue alternative education after facing challenges in traditional settings. Forty-one students will graduate from the Youth Opportunity (YO!) Academy high school, which operates in partnership with Baltimore City Public Schools, and 29 are graduating from the YO! Baltimore centers. All these graduates have overcome significant obstacles – such as being over-age for their grade level, dropping out of school, homelessness, teen pregnancy and substance abuse – to achieve academic and career preparation success. The keynote speaker for the YO! graduation will be Selwyn Ray, director of public affairs and community engagement for Big Brothers Big Sisters and the Maryland Mentoring Partnership. For years, Big Brothers Big Sisters and the Maryland Mentoring Partnership worked tirelessly, but separately, to make mentoring an integral part of the social fabric of Baltimore. In July 2010, realizing the great potential to reach more youth by combining forces, the organizations began operating as one. This union combines the two largest and most experienced mentoring organizations in Maryland in providing unparalleled quality in direct service mentoring support and expert training and technical assistance. WHEN: Wednesday, July 20, 2011; 6:30 p.m. WHERE: Johns Hopkins University Shriver Hall, 3400 N. Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21218. BACKGROUND: For the past 11 years, YO! Baltimore has been serving out-of-school youth and young adults by providing educational, personal development, and career preparation resources and activities. The graduates from the YO! Academy, an alternative high school for youth over-age and under-credited, will be sharing the stage with young adults who dropped out of school and earned their general Maryland High School diplomas through the two YO! Baltimore centers: YO! Academy and the Westside YO! Center 1510 W. Lafayette Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21217; 410-545-6953 Eastside YO! Center HEBCAC (Historical East Baltimore Community Action Coalition) 1212 N. Wolfe Street, Baltimore, MD 21213; 410-732-2661