What We Do

The Need

Between 2 and 5 million young adults aged 16 to 24 in the United States are disconnected from school and work. Low levels of education and employment skills and limited access to healthcare, childcare, and transportation make it difficult for low-income youth to secure or advance in living-wage jobs. Although resources and services to support these youth are available in their communities, they are often isolated from each other and narrowly targeted to individual needs. This results in incrementally positive changes in the lives of some youth while larger, institutionalized barriers to social mobility persist.

WorkUp brings together cohorts of youth to build their own personal assets and to organize networks of supports and investments that produce systemic change for underserved communities.