We are proud to raise funds for New York City youth. Fundraising from RBC Paddle Battle will be split evenly among our four benefitting charity partners. To learn more about the organizations you are supporting, please see below.
DREAM, formerly Harlem RBI, began in 1991 when a group of volunteers transformed an abandoned, garbage-strewn lot into two baseball diamonds for the youth of East Harlem. Today, DREAM serves more than 2,200 youth in kindergarten through college with year-round academic, sports, and enrichment programs in East Harlem, the South Bronx, and in Newark. DREAM’s comprehensive approach to youth development replaces the barriers inner-city youth typically face with concrete opportunities to build the skills and confidence needed to graduate high school, matriculate to college and break the cycle of poverty. Since 2005, 97% of DREAM seniors have graduated high school, 94% have been accepted into college and 99% of participants have avoided teen parenthood.
In 2008, after 17 years of working in East Harlem and producing exceptional results, DREAM Charter School was opened. DREAM Charter School’s mission is to prepare students for high-performing high schools, colleges and beyond through a rigorous academic program that develops critical thinkers who demonstrate a love of learning, strong character, and a commitment to wellness and active citizenship. Today, the school serves over 700 students in grades Pre-K through tenth grade. For 27 years, DREAM has inspired youth to recognize their potential and realize their dreams. The organization plans to grow its impact and scope of work and establish high-quality, high- impact sites as a national organization serving young people across the country.
The Opportunity Network (OppNet) works with students from historically and systematically underrepresented communities in developing their skills, knowledge, and passions to achieve their college and career goals. We work with students in our founding OppNet Fellows program for six years—from the summer after 10th grade through to college graduation, and into careers—and our results are remarkable: While less than 10% of low-income students in the U.S. graduate college, and even fewer will be ready for careers, 90% of OppNet Fellows graduate college in six years and 90% secure professional-track jobs or graduate school admission within six months of college graduation.
Through OppNet’s intensive, six-year Fellows program, a new world opens up for our nearly 900 students—a world of corporate field trips and mentors, workplace best practices and norms, internship preparedness, interview skills, and networking for college and professional success. OppNet provides our students with intensive college application guidance, including overnight college trips, group workshops, SAT tutoring, and extensive one-on-one counseling. Every summer, Fellows hold paid internships or participate in enrichment or study abroad programs, leaving OppNet’s program with robust resumes, concrete skills, and lifelong networks of support. Additionally, OppNet works with schools and youth-serving organizations nationwide through our Career Fluency® Partnerships program. OppNet leads Partners through the process of adapting our effective curriculum into their existing programs to amplify college and career outcomes for their students. Currently, OppNet is working with 30+ Partner schools and organizations across the country, and is reaching thousands more students.
The TEAK Fellowship believes that motivation and potential, not economic circumstances, should determine a student’s future. TEAK unlocks access to outstanding education and transformative experiences for exceptional NYC students, who use these opportunities to change their lives and the world around them.
Through intensive after school and summer classes, TEAK prepares middle school students to get into the nation’s most selective high schools and later into the nation’s most elite colleges. TEAK’s strong support system ensures that students thrive in their independent (day and boarding) high schools and graduate from college, ready to pursue their professional goals and positively impact the world.
NYC is home to some of the brightest youth in the world – but much of their potential is unrealized. While over 1,500 organizations help children in New York, it’s hard to identify the best and expand their reach. That’s where Youth INC comes in. Through a unique venture philanthropy model, we vet and then partner with the most promising youth-serving nonprofits. We teach them to fundraise, improve their governance, establish sustainability best practices, issue growth-accelerating grants, and measure their programs’ youth development impact. We have raised over $85 million for 170 nonprofit partners, enabling them to improve the lives of 220,000 NYC kids each year.