Vision
Change Inc. envisions a world in which children, youth and young adults, regardless of their place of birth or economic resources, succeed in school and grow to their full potential. In this world, families are embraced by empowered communities.
Mission
Change Inc. utilizes the power of relationships and community to create educational, training and healing opportunities for children, youth, young adults and families so that they can achieve their highest ambition.
Values
- Relationships are the key to change. In all of our programming, we strive to create and enhance relational resources. We believe that a relationship with a caring adult is the key protective factor for a young person.
- Cultural knowledge is critical to growth and healing. Utilization of cultural practice, tradition and wisdom is central to our mentoring and healing work.
- Being in community is a critical resource for human development. We strive to be builders of community.
- Working collaboratively with young people, families and communities to identify and address the needs they have identified is a key standard of our approach. We believe that everyone can learn and people can solve their own problems.
- Hope is an essential element to encouraging people challenged by poverty, racism, trauma and transition. We bring a strength-based, problem-solving attitude to our work removing barriers to success in school and life.
History
Change Inc. is the product of a merger of two community-based organizations, Guadalupe Alternative Programs and Change Inc., both originally founded to serve at-risk, underserved individuals and address the challenges of systemic poverty and racism that prevent Twin Cities families from achieving their full potential.
Guadalupe Alternative Programs, located on the West Side of Saint Paul, was founded in 1967 to provide an educational alternative for youth at-risk of school failure. The original Change Inc. was initiated in 1993 to provide supervision, training, consultation, and occasions for the inevitability of change, with a focus on issues of poverty and racism based primarily in the urban core of Minneapolis; this initiative was built on the founders’ previous work in inner-city community building that started in the 1960’s.
After more than a decade of close collaboration, both organizations determined that the most effective way to move forward would be to merge, adopting Change Inc. for the name of the organization with GAP School being retained as the name for our alternative high school and associated programs in Saint Paul. Through the merger, complete in June 2019, we are able to leverage additional resources, streamline operations, and draw on a large body of experience and deep ties to the community, helping us expand on our work to serve the diverse Twin Cities region.
The foundation of our approach is that relationships are the key to change. Change Inc.’s program activities, based on strong relationships and trust, holistically ensure our students are cognitively, socially, and emotionally equipped to succeed in school and life. We provide individualized education that attends to the social-emotional needs of students, including mental health services and basic needs resources such as meals, child care, and transportation. Because the challenges facing our students and their families are continually shifting, Change Inc. works to adapt and create programs that respond to the moving needs of our participants. Currently, our work is divided into three key programs: GAP School, the Community & School Collaborative (CSC), and the Change Institute.
Guadalupe Alternative Programs, located on the West Side of Saint Paul, was founded in 1967 to provide an educational alternative for youth at-risk of school failure. The original Change Inc. was initiated in 1993 to provide supervision, training, consultation, and occasions for the inevitability of change, with a focus on issues of poverty and racism based primarily in the urban core of Minneapolis; this initiative was built on the founders’ previous work in inner-city community building that started in the 1960’s.
After more than a decade of close collaboration, both organizations determined that the most effective way to move forward would be to merge, adopting Change Inc. for the name of the organization with GAP School being retained as the name for our alternative high school and associated programs in Saint Paul. Through the merger, complete in June 2019, we are able to leverage additional resources, streamline operations, and draw on a large body of experience and deep ties to the community, helping us expand on our work to serve the diverse Twin Cities region.
The foundation of our approach is that relationships are the key to change. Change Inc.’s program activities, based on strong relationships and trust, holistically ensure our students are cognitively, socially, and emotionally equipped to succeed in school and life. We provide individualized education that attends to the social-emotional needs of students, including mental health services and basic needs resources such as meals, child care, and transportation. Because the challenges facing our students and their families are continually shifting, Change Inc. works to adapt and create programs that respond to the moving needs of our participants. Currently, our work is divided into three key programs: GAP School, the Community & School Collaborative (CSC), and the Change Institute.
