Nine Years in the Works, Youth-Run Center Set to Open in an Inner-City Baltimore Neighborhood

What: Grand opening of The Dream House, a youth-run center for young people
When: 1 to 4 p.m., Saturday, May 8, 2010
Where: 1430 Carswell St., Baltimore
 
BALTIMORE—The Dream House, a youth center run by the Stadium School Youth Dreamers, is celebrating its grand opening May 8, nine years after middle school students in teacher Kristina Berdan’s class first conceptualized it.

Berdan, a 2007 Open Society Institute-Baltimore community fellow, said her students wanted to create a safe environment where youth could run after-school programs. Under her guidance, the Youth Dreamers bought a yellow house for $12,500 in an inner-city Baltimore neighborhood.  However, many residents were concerned that a youth center would bring violence and drugs. The students fought hard to change the neighbors’ impressions by hosting block parties and even Christmas caroling.

Their efforts paid off, and since then the Youth Dreamers have raised more than $800,000—mostly through bake sales, fundraisers, awards and grants—to renovate the building and support programming. The students worked closely with architects and contractors, overseeing their vision for the three-story house that will feature a cybercafé, homework and tutoring stations and a gallery for student art.

While awaiting completion of the house, the Youth Dreamers have been running after-school programs, such as Homework Club where middle and high school students are paid to mentor/tutor elementary aged students, as well as a Health Club for girls to talk about health and sexuality with experts.

Current and former Youth Dreamers will be on hand to mark the opening of the youth center. The theme, “There’s no place like home,” will allow guests to follow the yellow brick road through the house and see how courage, brains and a lot of heart have created the Dream House. For more information, visit: youthdreamers.org 

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OSI-Baltimore was started in 1998 by philanthropist George Soros as a laboratory to better understand and solve the most intractable problems facing urban America. OSI-Baltimore is a private operating foundation that focuses its work exclusively on the root causes of three intertwined problems—drug addiction, an over-reliance on incarceration and the obstacles that keep youth from succeeding inside and outside of the classroom. OSI-Baltimore also sponsors the Baltimore Community Fellows, now over 100 members strong, who work to create opportunity and bring justice to people in the city’s most underserved neighborhoods.