NRPA's office of youth services starts workforce initiative. (Tip-Off).

When large numbers of park and recreation employees begin to retire in the next decade, there likely won't be enough qualified candidates to fill their positions. To address this need, NRPA has launched a workforce development initiative called National Youth Congress. Created with help from the National Recreation Foundation, the initiative will expose youths to career opportunities in the park, recreation and conservation field.

NRPA's National Youth Congress consists of three elements:

* Town hall forums that give youths the opportunity to voice their opinions about parks and recreation in a group setting.

* Action councils that establish teen groups in communities and offer these groups the leadership training necessary to apply in their daily lives along with the value of community service.

* Internships that give youths the opportunity to gain practical experience in the park, recreation and conservation field.

Because leadership is such an integral part of the program, NRPA created a partnership with the Points of Light Foundation, which sponsors the Prudential Youth Leadership Institute (PYLI). The PYLI training is an innovative leadership and community service training program that teaches youth workers hands-on leadership exercises that they can in turn teach to the youth in their communities.

On Aug. 6, NRPA hosted its first train-the-trainer workshop. During the three-and-a-half-day meeting, 28 adult recreation professionals representing 15 states had the opportunity to experience this program, which NRPA is now offering to teenage students all over the U.S. After learning about NRPA's National Youth Congress program and experiencing the PYLI 30-hour curriculum, the youth workers took the program back to the youths they serve. Just two weeks after their training, the youth workers had already begun to organize town hall forums for the youths in their communities.

NRPA wants to offer this program to all youth workers in the recreation field, and therefore plans to host another leadership workshop for youth workers in March 2003.

For more information on how you or your organization can become involved in NRPA's National Youth Congress, or to learn how to participate in the March 2003 workshop, contact Sonia Amir, NRPA's director of youth services, at [e-mail] or 705-858-0784.