We provide direct support to youth organizing groups across the country through innovative programs. Learn more about how we help build the field through our programs.

Praxis for Power Lab

Praxis for Power supports a cohort of eight organizations with a high level of alignment with FCYO’s Power to Win Framework. Participatnts are working to advance their capacities for building transformative power while simultaneously playing a leadership role in organizing the youth organizing field toward greater alignment, strategic capacity, and power-building.

Level-Up Lab

The youth organizing field has come a long way, yet meeting this moment will require us to build a new level of power. It will require us to face and transcend our current limitations with honesty and vulnerability. It will require us to Level Up.

Youth Speakers Bureau

FCYO's Youth Speakers Bureau is an assembly of five passionate and diverse youth organizers who are looking to build out their communications skills while serving as an advocate for the field of youth organizing. FCYO’s Youth Speakers Bureau is designed to support participants through their professional development as organizers. Foundational organizing topics center on thought leadership and communication - practices that are critical to community-based youth organizing.

Take Action for Power Fellowship

At FCYO, we have identified a need for opportunities for newly mobilized young leaders to come into closer connection with one another and the youth organizing field as a whole, and to develop their capacity for strategic thinking while building in collective ways. And we are so excited by the possibilities of expanding our community in this way, which is why we are launching the Take Action for Power Fellowship.

Youth Organizing for Climate Action and Racial Equity (YO-CARE) Capacity-Building Fund

Through the Youth Organizing for Climate Action and Racial Equity (YO-CARE) Capacity-Building Fund, FCYO will directly provide grantmaking and capacity building resources to young people of color and young people from other frontline communities who are collectively organizing to address the climate crisis. As part of a year-long learning community, we are looking to support youth organizers from both racial justice and climate justice organizations to deepen their analyses of the root causes of climate injustice and racial inequality, develop and sharpen their organizing capacities, and build and strengthen relationships.

The Organizing to Win Lab

The Organizing to Win Lab is a one-year grantmaking initiative and the entry point into FCYO’s GenPower Labs. It will support a broad range of youth organizing groups addressing the most pressing issues of the moment. Groups will be introduced to FCYO's Power to Win Framework, strategic political education, organizational assessment tools and a peer learning community rooted in vulnerability and transparency toward the building of meaningful power. It is intended for groups who are evaluating their strategic approach to strengthen their organizing methodologies.

The GenPower Labs

The GenPower Labs is FCYO’s response to the charges we face at this moment. As the core of our new program, the GenPower Labs is a three tiered strategic grantmaking and capacity building initiative designed to build a more powerful, strategic, and aligned youth organizing field with the capacities to address the challenges of this moment.

FCYO Moment to Movement Fund 2020 Grant Awards: Young People Advancing Climate Justice and Voter Engagement

FCYO is proud to announce our 2020 Moment to Movement Fund grant partners. The Moment to Movement Fund is providing one-year grants to youth organizing groups responding to the current moment in ways that build power for low-income young people, young people of color, and gender oppressed young people to advance a more just and equitable society. In 2020 we are focused on two critical issues: climate change and voter engagement. Now more than ever, we believe the leadership of young people who have been most impacted by injustice is critical to creating a more just world.

Healthy Communities Bridge Initiative

FCYO’s 20th anniversary poses a unique opportunity to reflect on the advances youth organizing has made over the last 20 years, to evaluate our learnings from the Healthy Communities Initiative, and to put forth a courageous vision where health, justice, democracy, and equity are core values. This one-year cohort will focus on generating opportunities for alumni organizations of FCYO’s Healthy Communities Initiative to strengthen their skills and deepen their analyses. In addition, FCYO will assess the health equity landscape for youth of color to ensure future initiatives are grounded in the reality of how young people experience the adverse impacts of inequity on their health. Drawing from assessments of previous initiatives, below are the strategic areas we see as necessary to create healthier schools and communities. These will be the focal points of the organizer training, webinars, and grantmaking.

Learning & Exchange Fund (2018 - 2019)

The FCYO Learning and Exchange Fund will awarded grants of up to $5,000 across the country for youth organizing groups that articulated clear learning goals for Peer-to-Peer Learning Exchange projects with other organizing entities. Organizations that would like to learn from each other’s model and/or strategies received grant support to engage in a shared learning activity.