Stoked, the organization founded by entrepreneur Steve Larosiliere and action sports announcer Sal Masekela turned 10 this year and they’re taking this as a the perfect time to update everyone on all the great things theme been doing for low-income high school students in New York City and Los Angeles. How’s this:
The Brooklyn-based organization, which has a satellite office in Los Angeles, proudly boasts a 100% high school graduation rate among program participants; roughly 30% higher than the national average for disadvantaged students in New York and California. Through their involvement with STOKED, students receive 41% more education and career development experience than traditional classroom learning provides.
That’s a pretty amazing statistic, right? For the official word from Stoked, please follow the jump.RIDING A SNOWBOARD CAN CLOSE THE OPPORTUNITY GAP FOR LOW-INCOME YOUTH
STOKED Celebrates Ten Years of Snow Mentor Program through Partnerships with Kelly Clark Foundation, Belleayre Mountain and Snow Summit
NEW YORK, NY – March 18, 2015 – Founded in 2005 by entrepreneur Steve Larosiliere and action sports industry veteran Sal Masekela, STOKED is a non-profit youth development organization focused on closing the opportunity gap for low-income high school students in New York City and Los Angeles.
STOKED’s mission is to promote personal development, academic achievement, and healthy living to underserved youth through immersion in action sports and the surrounding skate/snow/surf culture. For the past decade, STOKED has served more than 3,500 students from over a dozen high schools on both coasts.
The Brooklyn-based organization, which has a satellite office in Los Angeles, proudly boasts a 100% high school graduation rate among program participants; roughly 30% higher than the national average for disadvantaged students in New York and California. Through their involvement with STOKED, students receive 41% more education and career development experience than traditional classroom learning provides.
Recognized as one of the most innovative and successful youth development initiatives in the country, this winter STOKED’s cornerstone Snow Mentor program celebrated its tenth season. Through a series of weekend trips to partner resorts—Belleayre Mountain for NYC participants, and Snow Summit for LA participants—the Snow Mentor program once again taught students how to set goals, overcome obstacles, increase self-reliance, and ultimately create a vision for their future to aspire toward. This year was STOKED’s most impactful season yet, with collectively over 6,000 hours of snowboarding enjoyed by participating youth.
Helping to make this season better than ever was support from the Kelly Clark Foundation in the form of lift ticket subsidies through a grant from the foundation’s Snowboard Passport Program. Like STOKED, professional snowboarder Kelly Clark’s namesake non-profit strives to empower youth—often times disadvantaged, inner city youth—by using snowboarding as a vehicle to help them achieve their highest potential in life.
“We are absolutely thrilled that in our tenth year, we have been able to continue to provide long-term snowboarding mentoring programs to underserved youth in NYC and LA,” says STOKED President and Co-Founder, Steve Larosiliere.
“Although it is an expensive sport that is often times inaccessible to low-income households, snowboarding and other action sports continue to be an excellent way to accelerate the development of youth to make them more confident, build community, and prepare them for college and a solid career path,” continues Larosiliere, aka, Stoked Steve. “We are grateful to our partner mountains—Belleayre and Snow Summit—and to the Kelly Clark Foundation for not only helping to make this year possible, but our best year yet!”
With spring just days away, another Snow Mentor program will wrap up for the season. But STOKED’s mission will continue on this summer through its Skate Mentor and Surf Mentor programs in both New York City and Los Angeles.
To learn more and find out how you can get involved, please visit: www.stoked.org
