At the Growing Up Boulder Annual Youth Event held at the YMCA on October 9, 2010, over 75 middle- and high-school students were asked to re-design three areas of the city to make them more youth-friendly and sustainable. The three areas included the Diagonal Plaza, Arapahoe and 55th Street, and 13th Street (where the Farmers’ Market is held).
The students broke into small groups and were assisted by city planning staff, local design professionals, CU faculty and undergraduates, city council members, and planning board members. Each group chose one area to re-design and was given a large aerial photo of the area, markers, colored paper and blocks to create a model of their design.
The event also treated the students to pizza, raffle prizes, break dancing and a concert by a popular teen band.
The following photos are of high-school student researchers surveying businesses along the Pearl Street Mall on September 12. The short questionnaire was designed by the students to help determine which ones have youth-friendly policies and welcome youth into their business as well as which ones will hire youth under 18 years of age. The preliminary results of the research will be presented on October 10th at the Growing Up Boulder kick-off celebration and the research will continue in the fall to include all of Boulder (Photo credits: Debbie Flanders Cushing).
On July 23, 2009, more than 45 middle- and high-school students from around the city met to help plan Growing Up Boulder, the Boulder Child- & Youth-Friendly City Initiative (Photo credits: Lynn Lickteig).
(click on thumbnails to view larger image.)
Members of the Youth Engagement Steering Committee worked on August 27 in small groups to plan the October 10 event (Photo credits: Lynn Lickteig and Brett Wagner).
Please click on the image below to see our photo gallery for the October 10th Kick-Off Celebration: