Adobe and City Year Bring Youth Together for Learning

Founded in Boston, Massachusetts in 1988, City Year is a national service organization with 15 regional chapters across the United States, including San Jose/Silicon Valley, California, and Seattle/King County, Washington. This "urban Peace Corps" brings together young people between the ages of 17 and 24 for a year of full-time community service, leadership development, and civic engagement. Improving the academic skills of children in low-income communities is one of City Year's primary focuses.

City Year is a long-standing Adobe Community Investment Partner. Adobe has been a local City Year sponsor since 1996 in San Jose, was a founding sponsor of City Year Seattle/King County in 1998, and was a national sponsor in 1999 and 2000. Over the years, Adobe has provided more than US$600,000 in cash grants to City Year, as well as software products and training, and the use of company facilities and catering services for numerous events.

In 2002, Adobe continued its local support, committing US$400,000 over two years to sponsor City Year teams at Bachrodt and Anne Darling Elementary Schools in San Jose, and at B. F. Day and Wing Luke Elementary Schools in Seattle. Team members serve as tutors and mentors, both in the classroom and on the playground.

Adobe's relationship with City Year Seattle/King County is especially meaningful. The organization helped welcome Adobe to the Fremont neighborhood when the company opened its facilities there in 1998 and has since become a community ambassador for the company, providing corps members for Adobe events and in turn inviting Adobe employees to participate in City Year volunteer activities.

Most recently, Adobe's City Year teams in Seattle formed the local Starfish Corps, which runs a literacy-based after-school program that includes reading, math, arts and crafts, and service projects designed to promote academic improvement and positive citizenship. In 2002, City Year collaborated with Adobe's Seattle Philanthropy Council to host Starfish sessions at Adobe facilities for students of B. F. Day Elementary School, Adobe's partner school in Seattle since 1998. Corps members tutored 165 B. F. Day students, with 92 percent improving at least one grade level in reading and 93 percent improving at least one grade level in math. Starfish and other activities at Wing Luke Elementary School assisted an additional 268 students.

Adobe's City Year Seattle/King County sponsorship also helps support the Young Heroes program, an after-school and Saturday service club for middle-school students, and the Team Read program, which trains high school students district-wide to become reading tutors for second- and third-graders. In 2002, corps members mentored 273 high school students, who in turn coached 283 young readers. Adobe's City Year Seattle/King County team personally tutored 120 additional elementary school students individually or in small groups, with 85 percent improving at least one grade level in reading and math.

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