"The [New Door Ventures job-training] program for youth is very helpful because it gives us skills that we can use not only at New Door, but at any other job..."

As we sip coffee together at a café, my first impression of Karla Gonzalez remains unchanged: she is a composed, mature, lovely and quiet young woman. She was born in Mexico and moved to San Francisco with her family before her tenth birthday, in hopes of a better economic life.

At 17, she is the oldest of three children and has been a model to her two younger siblings, overcoming challenges such as being in a new country, learning a new language, and helping her single mom.

In April 2005, Karla’s classmate at John O’Connell High School convinced her to go to an elective lunchtime session on job opportunities. At that session, she was introduced to New Door Ventures. She applied and joined New Door’s Work Experience Program (WEP) which offers after-school, paid job internships.

When she graduated from WEP, she was invited to apply for one of two student staff positions at New Door. The two student staff support the four Youth Development staff in planning and organizing events, and recruiting their peers to get to know New Door and join its program.

She got hired and quickly started organizing events such as movie and Open Mic nights to involve youth in New Door. Says Youth Development Program Manager Joel Brown Tarman, “Karla is finding ways to do even more with these events. Rather than just providing kids with something to do, she selects content that helps them think about the world around them in a new way.”

Her largest project involved organizing a group of 10 peers to volunteer time as part of Global Youth Service Day in April 2006. The project stemmed from New Door's Spring Break Leadership workshop for high school students, where Karla skillfully facilitated discussions about volunteerism and community involvement with her peers.

“I am most impressed with Karla’s development of her innate leadership talents. I know that I can trust her to run with a task and take care of all of the follow through. I have seen tremendous growth in her ability to motivate others by involving them in whatever she is doing. Karla is figuring out exactly who she wants to be, and it is very exciting to watch, says Brown Tarman.

She plans to attend San Francisco State in the fall and major in social work. Her dream is to fight poverty worldwide, perhaps by working with homeless kids in Mexico. She says “the program for youth is very helpful because it gives us skills that we can use not only at New Door, but at any other job and in other places in our lives, too.”

New Door has helped Karla find her voice and shape who she wants to be and the role she wants to play in her community in the world. Her role as a youth staff member is giving her a first taste at leadership and organizing, and she is learning that she likes it!

- Bethany Nelson, Volunteer