Donate
Youth

Celebrating Our Future Leaders

La Colaborativa
June 17, 2022
place holder

Summer is almost here and with it the end of another school year! Graduating high school is an achievement in itself, but especially for the La Colaborativa youth who have beat the odds and excelled in school, in spite of personal challenges. Our youth work readiness programs, internships, and career exploration programs have more than 80 youth engaged. Today, we want to highlight the accomplishments of two of our young leaders who have recently just graduated and have fought for equity and housing rights with La Colaborativa!

Mayerly has been working with La Colaborativa as a youth leader in the RIOT SQUAD since 2020. During her time there, she has worked on campaigns focused on education justice and housing campaigns, making transformative change in her community. Outside of her time at La Colaborativa, Mayerly supporter herself and her brothers in the absence of her parents all while maintaining straight A’s and excelled in Advanced Placement classes.

Mayerley’s exemplary leadership and passion for her community made her the perfect fit as La Colaborativa’s newest staff member this summer, where she will help to facilitate our Summer Youth Employment Program to a group of younger teens. This fall, Mayerly will attend UMASS Boston on a full scholarship, where she hopes to pursue her pa

ssions in a STEM field and continue to give back to her community.

Saul is a young leader who immigrated to the United States by himself three years ago and has been exploring his passion for community organizing and service ever since. You may have seen Saul tirelessly working at La Colaborativa’s food pantry these past few years, ensuring that everyone in our community has access to food and our wrap-around services. Saul plans to pursue vocational training while still working with La Colaborativa to give back to our community.

These inspiring young people have already made transformative change thanks to their own hard work and dedication as well as the support and structure provided by our staff and volunteers. Young people, especially those who must overcome barriers of racism, anti-immigrant sentiment, and poverty, deserve to be lifted up and deserve the support and resources La Colaborativa provides.

Thanks to generous donations, we’re able to support hundreds of young leaders, like Mayerly and Saul, to not only survive, but thrive.

Related Posts

Land Acknowledgment

At La Colaborativa, we believe that building a more just, equitable, and healthy future begins with recognizing the histories of the land and the communities that came before us, while confronting the systemic inequities that continue to shape our society today.

We acknowledge that La Colaborativa is located in Winnisimmet, now known as Chelsea, Massachusetts, on the ancestral and unceded homeland of the Massachusett People, whose deep connections to this land, culture, and community endure today.

We honor the Indigenous peoples who have stewarded this land for generations and recognize the lasting consequences of colonization, forced displacement, dispossession, and systemic injustice. These histories are not simply part of the past. Their legacies continue to influence access to land, housing, healthcare, education, economic opportunity, and the resources that allow individuals, families, and communities to thrive.

At La Colaborativa, we understand that health equity cannot be achieved without addressing the social determinants of health, the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work, and age.

Structural racism, poverty, housing instability, food insecurity, and barriers to education, employment, and healthcare disproportionately affect immigrant, Indigenous, and historically marginalized communities, perpetuating cycles of inequality across generations.

This understanding is at the heart of La Colaborativa's holistic, community-driven model. Our work recognizes that the challenges facing our communities are deeply interconnected and cannot be addressed in isolation. By integrating housing stability, food access, healthcare, workforce development, education, economic mobility, and community advocacy, we work to address the root causes of inequity, strengthen community resilience, and create pathways toward lasting social and economic opportunity.

Rooted in our mission of Levantando al Pueblo, we believe that meaningful change begins by centering the voices, experiences, cultural identities, and leadership of the communities most affected by systemic injustice. Just as we honor the resilience and enduring presence of Indigenous peoples, we recognize the strength of immigrant families and historically marginalized communities who continue to shape our collective future.

For us, a land acknowledgment is more than a statement of respect. It is a reminder of our responsibility to turn recognition into meaningful action, challenge the systems that perpetuate inequality, and advance a model of community well-being grounded in dignity, belonging, self-determination, and justice.

We offer this acknowledgment with respect and gratitude to the Massachusett People, their ancestors, elders, and present-day communities, and with a continued commitment to learning, solidarity, and building a future where every community has the resources, opportunities, and power to thrive.