Young Planners Network

2010

PLANet Youth 2040: Look to the Future, Chicago, Illinois; June 10 - 13, 2010

This year's conference will focus on long-range solutions to creating healthy, equitable cities.  Young Planners will expand their ability to integrate urban planning disciplines (i.e. housing, design, sustainability, transportation), create long-term guidelines for improvement of their cities, and explore why their participation is essential.  Over one hundred young people will participate in:

Skill building & peer presentations, Mobile & participatory workshops, Film festival & open mic night, and more!

For more information about the conference (including how to register) see our website.

An excerpt from our Press Release:

While national media turns its attention to outbreaks of violence among young people in our cities, an alternate trend receives little coverage - youth participation in urban planning.  In metropolitan regions across the United States, highly organized groups of young people are working to strategically address issues of quality of life and sustainability in their communities, using the tools of professional planners.  Over the past three years, several of these groups have formed a grassroots network to increase their efficacy by sharing best practice models and coordinating efforts.

Since it's founding in 2007, the Young Planners Network (YPN) has expanded from twenty to over three hundred members nationwide.  In cities across the country, youth are engaged in urban planning with support from local institutions, universities, schools, communities, and non-profit organizations.  Chapters serve to connect youth and adult allies working in the field, through monthly meetings that provide a venue for partnership and community-building, a place to share work and ideas, to plan and implement local projects that better their communities and cities...(view the whole release on PLANETIZEN here!)

Help Sponsor a Young Planner!

Over the past three years, YPN has engaged high school students across the US in a dialogue about youth involvement in urban planning.  Most Young Planners come from communities of color or low-income households, and are unable to pay for airfares or conference registration fees.  This year, we are taking a proactive approach to request scholarship donations by describing the benefits of donation at several levels.  Your entire contribution is tax deductable!

Sponsorship Levels:

  • Gold - $1800 or more will sponsor 3 young people to attend PLANet Youth!
    • Recognition in program booklet (Premier)
    • Logo on conference t-shirt
    • Recognition on Young Planners Network website (Logo)
    • Photo and thank you note from each scholarship recipient
  • Silver - $1200 - 1800 will sponsor 2 young people to attend PLANet Youth!
    • Recognition in program booklet (Logo)
    • Logo on conference t-shirt
    • Recognition on Young Planners Network website (Logo)
    • Photo and thank you note from each scholarship recipient
  • Bronze - $600 - 1200 will sponsor 1 young person to attend PLANet Youth!
    • Recognition in program booklet
    • Recognition on Young Planners Network website
    • Photo and thank you note from each scholarship recipient
    • Your entire contribution is tax deductable!
  • Green - Less than $600 will sponsor part of 1 young person to attend PLANet Youth!
    • Recognition in program booklet
    • Recognition on Young Planners Network website

Make checks payable to California Center for Civic Participation (our fiscal host) with “YPN Scholarship” in the memo line.  If you would like your contribution to support local youth, please write your city as well.  We will send you a receipt!

Send to:
California Center for Civic Participation
1220 H Street, Suite 102
Sacramento, CA 95814

Please contact alissa(at)youngplannersnetwork(dot)org with any questions, or to connect with your local Steering Committee representative.

2009

PLANet Youth 2009: Building Bridges to a Sustainable Future, San Francisco Bay Area, June 4-7, 2009

We are pleased to announce the third annual Young Planners Network Conference! Click here for the Conference Announcement, Call For Proposals, and Pre-Registration Form.

2008

PLANet YOUTH: NYC 2008 Conference for Youth Leaders From Around the Country to be held at Academy of Urban Planning, Brooklyn April 3-6, 2008

Brooklyn, NY – International organization devoted to “creating a place at the table” for youth in urban planning, policy and community change holds first annual conference bringing together young planners and adult allies to network and share best practices.

Young people possess an innate curiosity to explore the city, ask challenging questions, and imagine possibilities. Just by traveling from home to school, biking to the park, or hanging with friends on the block, they become expert evaluators of neighborhood spaces.  Still, they are often left out of public processes where decisions are made about the future of the spaces they use.

Founded in May 2007 at the Planners Network Conference in New Orleans, the Young Planners Network (YPN) has since tripled its membership, establishing five Local Chapters (in New York, New Orleans, the Bay Area, Chicago, and Denver), receiving fiscal sponsorship and capacity-building support from the Center for Cities & Schools at UC Berkeley, and presenting work in conferences and journals nationwide.

Young Planners are students engaged in urban planning, policy or action in their communities, either through a school project, internship, after school program or community organization.  Adult Allies are teachers, mentors, employers, and community members supporting the work of Young Planners. YPN brings together Young Planners and Adult Allies who are working to ‘create a place at the table’ for youth in planning processes, by both incorporating planning content into K-12 education and by advocating for change in planning practice.

PLANet YOUTH: NYC 2008 – Celebrating Youth Leadership in Planning is YPN’s inaugural annual conference, where youth and adults from New York, New Orleans, Chicago, the Bay Area, Denver, Boston, Seattle, and Toronto will learn and share strategies for increasing youth participation through a variety of interactive workshops. Conference highlights include an opening reception hosted by Brooklyn Center for the Urban Environment, issue-based NYC mobile workshops and tours including an environmental justice canoe trip down the Bronx River and a walking tour of youth-created community murals, and a celebration at St. Ann’s Warehouse in DUMBO featuring films and poetry created and performed by youth. 

YPN conference organizers hope that this event will not only expand the organization’s geographic reach, but also raise the profile of the ground-breaking work happening in the field of youth participation in planning. YPN founding member and Academy of Urban Planning 12th grader Greicy Puma explained, “No matter what your age is, change in the community will affect you.  Youth are stakeholders too, and we are creating opportunities to make our voices heard.”

All interested youth, educators, students, planners, and community-based organizations can still register to attend. More information, including a detailed schedule of events and registration materials is available online at http://www.youngplannersnetwork.org.

Contact:
Meredith Phillips Almeida, National YPN Co-Director, (718) 909-5780,  meredith(at)youngplannersnetwork(dot)org

 


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