Video: Accepting The Challenge – ‘My Brother’s Keeper’ Summit Held in Starkville

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STARKVILLE, Miss. (WCBI) — Some Starkville and Oktibbeha County residents have accepted a new challenge. My Brother’s Keeper is all about helping our young people stay on track and providing them with support to obtain a successful future.

It’s a community wide effort, implemented by President Obama. My Brother’s Keeper is a challenge that seeks to engage the community in ensuring positive outcomes for youth, especially young boys and men of color.

“We see the opportunity. We see the potential and we see how an investment in this particular segment can really be positive for our community. It can be a game changer for everyone,” said organizer, Orlando Trainer.

The Young Boys and Men of Color summit offers a variety of tools and presentations to develop a plan of action for empowering today’s youth.

Local leaders, educators and youth are involved in the community wide challenge, all with one goal, improving lives and overcoming barriers.

“We’ve identified segments in the community where we see a lot of potential but yet they have some obstacles and we’re hoping through events like this we can help identify those groups and identify the obstacles but at the end of the day, identify solutions to those problems,” said Trainer.

The summit focused on three areas: early childhood education, reading on grade level and graduation rates.

Professionals assessed how young men of color measure up in these areas. Organizers say this is just one of many summits to come and Starkville Mayor Parker Wiseman says the city is accepting the challenge indefinitely.

“We are on a journey and we have not charted a destination for our journey. Hopefully we will see successes and we will identify new goals and objectives when we have succeeded on our original goals and objectives and we’ll continue to move to higher and higher heights,” said Mayor Parker Wiseman.

Organizers are planning more Summits in the near future.