D.R.E.A.M.S.’ vision is that one day; every child in the Bay Area will dream and dream big knowing the possibilities of their dreams turning into a reality. Dream’s creates essential opportunities for our youth to hope for their possible future success, to connect with other people that think and feel like them to grow physically, mentally and academically.
There is some debate about the importance of Dreams vs. Reality. Our experience is that diminishing opportunities for unsupported dreams in our society have left kids with a very thin understanding of how to progress towards their own dreams and that it is important to have mentors introduce some basic rules to make their dreams become possible to achieve. We developed a culture of freedom at a clinic session so that our youth begin to think and imagine. This structure is designed to encourage our youth to gain confidences towards pursing their dreams. Ultimately our unique approach towards helping youth to dream provides greater independence and high self-esteem amongst their peers.
Our experience at D.R.E.A.M.S. shows us that supporting our youth with their dreams creates an important opportunity to teach our youth leadership skills. In particular, we are huge fans of planning ahead. Building a culture that acknowledges the effects of short and long term goals and provides a simple, playful tool for addressing them, ultimately makes it easier for our youth to recognize and address more serious planning techniques.
D.R.E.A.M.S. believe that there is a rewarding success in having mentors alongside of our youth. A D.R.E.A.M.S. mentor presences in the clinic sessions only serves to perpetuate the role-model status-quo. A mentor introduces an important element of leadership and shared humanity, making the clinic of D.R.E.A.M.S. more accessible, and helping their peers feel safer and more connected.
D.R.E.A.M.S.’ philosophy is structure with an eye towards our youth growing in the process of daring to dream. We believe that mentors who work with youth should know how to help develop their imagination, but ideally not be too good at it. We believe that planning ahead is a great success tool most of the time. We believe that sometimes you just dream, and sometimes your dreams turn into reality, but the most important thing is daring to dream because our dreams should be fulfilled. D.R.E.A.M.S. matter!
