When Resilience Starts With the City’s Most Vulnerable Youth

A former high school principal, Kimball Thomas recalls being disheartened to see young adults loitering in some of the struggling neighborhoods of Tallahassee, Florida. He saw them in the streets and in parks, at bus stops and near convenience stores, “doing absolutely nothing,” he says. Some of those same kids call him their “street” principal.

Thomas heads TEMPO (Tallahassee Engaged in Meaningful Productivity for Opportunity), a city initiative he launched two years ago to curb violence by helping “disconnected youth” between 16 and 24 years who aren’t in school and who are unemployed earn their GED or secure a vocational job. The program has had 640 participants, many from “promise zones”—areas designated by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development as having the highest poverty and violence rates in the city. Thomas says some 7,000 teens and young adults are eligible, and the city hopes to reach 1,000 participants by 2020.