Mental Toughness Training Activities at YouthBuild North Shore

Mental Toughness Training is a period of orientation for students wishing to enter a YouthBuild program. They are exposed to a number of activities designed to prepare them for YouthBuild while determining their readiness to undertake this adventure. Although every site has a Mental Toughness portion, each individual program designs the activities to meet their own needs for a period of at least two weeks. At YouthBuild North Shore, one of the key activities is CPR-First Aid training for all potential students. Not only do they learn a skill that will come in handy if there is an emergency on-the-job or at home, they also acquire the credential that is important to potential employers.

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During Mental Toughness, potential members explore all 5 of the YouthBuild components. Here, potential members are paired up and tasked with developing their own mini-communities. Through this exercise, they learn about all of the pieces that come together to make a community and how even the smallest park, company, or service can have a large and lasting impact on everyone and everything. 

All of the activities that take place during Mental Toughness have a real meaning for the success that the young person can achieve in the program. They may not always understand that concept right away, but staff will often hear, later in the program, "That's why we did that activity in Mental Toughness."

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