About the Nonprofit
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DREAM's mission is to help close the opportunity gap for youth in low-income housing. This “opportunity gap” is a multifaceted issue. Through inequitable and racialized systems, there is a growing socio-economic gap in resources and access to adult mentors for youth in low-income households. Growing up in this system, young people can often become marginalized because of such arbitrary circumstances as race, gender, and socioeconomic position.
DREAM works towards this mission through a year-round program array that includes: Village Mentoring, After School Enrichment, Summer Enrichment, Guided Mentoring, and visits to our residential overnight camp in Northern Vermont, Camp DREAM.
Guided mentoring is a two-tiered, cross-age mentoring program that fosters relationships between high school and elementary-aged youth all over Vermont. Throughout our lives, we are mentors (those who provide guidance to others) and mentees (those who learn from and lean on others). Often, we are in both roles. Through a customized, structured curriculum and intensive one-on-one and group mentoring in a school environment, youth learn when and why to shift between these two roles and explore how they can be their most authentic selves in all settings. Deep mentoring relationships are the key to achieving this goal.
