New Horizons Foundation - Lupeni, Romania: Adventure Education and Service Learning strategies for (inter)personal development in partnership with Young Life

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Letters of Recommendation

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SUSAN E. STROUD,
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
stroud@icicp.org
www.icicp.org

Dana Bates
Executive Director
New Horizons Foundation
O.P. 1
C.P. 12
Lupeni
Hunedoara 2696
Romania

Dear Dana and the New Horizons Foundation,

It is with great pleasure that I write a letter commending the work that New Horizons Foundation (NHF) has undertaken in Romania.

At Innovations in Civic Participation (ICP), we envision a world in which young people in every nation are actively engaged in improving their lives and their communities through civic participation. Beyond attending school or looking for work, we see average eighteen-year olds around the world sharing the common experience of tackling the most entrenched problems in their communities and entering into adult life empowered to find ways to be part of the solution.

There are a number of organizations around the world that actively engage young people in improving their lives and their communities. Taken together, these programs constitute an emerging global youth service movement. As the organization that is supporting this broader movement, ICP is in contact with many of the local and national entities implementing programs and policies on the ground.

One of the best examples is the New Horizons Foundation (NHF) in Romania. ICP provided NHF with a grant to develop a youth service policy in Romania, a country where the educational discipline of service-learning is almost completely unknown. NHF sought to include youth service within Romania's National Youth Action Plan (Y-NAP). Toward this aim, NHF hosted the first national conference on service-learning and social capital and made policy recommendations for Y-NAP.

Impressed by the measurable impact NHF has had in Romania in such a short period of time, ICP decided to highlight NHF in a publication prepared for the US Dept of State. By providing opportunities for young people to actively address community needs in a structured format, NHF is not only bettering the community, but also helping young people to develop the tools necessary to properly shape and participate in civil society and government.

The New Horizons Foundation is truly a model youth civic engagement program. I wish you all the best in your efforts.

Sincerely,

Susan Stroud
Executive Director

Susan Stroud
Susan E. Stroud is the Executive Director of Innovations in Civic Participation, a non-profit organization she founded in 2001 to support the development of program and policy innovations in national and community service globally. Susan is also the Co-Director of the Global Service Institute, an organization dedicated to increasing worldwide knowledge and understanding of service. One of the White House architects of the National and Community Trust Act of 1993, she served in senior positions at the Corporation for National and Community Service to implement AmeriCorps and Learn and Serve America. Previously, she was the founding director of Campus Compact, a national coalition of university presidents, and the Swearer Center for Public Service at Brown University. Susan worked in several countries while consulting to the Ford Foundation, most notably helping to create a network of university-based programs in South Africa and various service initiatives in Russia and Mexico. Susan is the founding president of the International Council on National Youth Policy and a senior fellow of the University College of Citizenship and Public Service at Tufts University.