Youth - An Asset or a Liability?

Something I've been thinking about lately is how the concept and perception of 'youth' affects the way that FORGE is viewed and judged by the public.  It is undeniable that FORGE's American staff is on the young side – the average age is about 25 years old.  At the same time, however, we pride ourselves on our precision, our professionalism, and the maturity of our decision-making.  But when people look at us or hear about us through the media, they often see little more than young people doing good stuff.

In our early years we had no choice but to embrace our youth and try to use it to our best advantage.  There were special funds available for young people doing things in the world, and the abnormal timing of it all was something that drew people's interest to the cause.  Not having the track record to point to, our youthful exuberance, passion, and work ethic was often what drew donors to us.  We knew this and worked to highlight it in how we presented ourselves.

But in recent years, things have changed.  While we've retained much of the passion and zeal, we've also matured a lot along the way.  We are now very measured, very consistent, and very professional in what we do and how we do it.  We have young people on our staff, but they perform their jobs with maturity and precision.  We don't feel as young as we feel we are perceived to be.

So could the perception of youth that was so seminal in our founding years now be getting in our way?  Are there ways in which the attention on youth could crowd out or make more dubious our underlying reliability and professionalism?  Or is youth still our greatest asset – the thing that makes what we do appeal to others as likely and exciting?  There is no doubt in my mind that our youth attracts attention, I just often wonder if it's the kind of attention that's most beneficial to our cause.  If reporters contact us to do a story, its almost always because they want to do a story on me – the girl who started something at 20.  Often, I feel like to the reporters, the "something" doesn't matter – what FORGE does, how we do it, and  whether we are good at it is viewed as almost inconsequential.  The story that reporters want to tell is about a girl who was inspired and dropped out of college to pursue her dream.  It may draw people's attention or warm their hearts, but how much does it do to promote what we really care about: the organization's model, its efficiency, and its efficacy?

- Kjerstin Erickson

www.FORGEnow.org