The Arlington Alliance for Youth

The Arlington Alliance for Youth, formed by Arlington's 5 Kiwanis Clubs and the City, helps mobilize both citizens and key agencies around the five promises embraced by America’s Promise (www.americaspromise.org). The program's five promises support our youth by encouraging caring adults, safe places after school, healthy start and future, marketable skills, and opportunities for community service. By fulfilling these promises, we help build the character and competence of our youth. Additionally, these youth are five to ten times more likely when they become adults to be good citizens that care about their community and its youth.

The Arlington Alliance for Youth Board was formed in fall 2004 to organize the Alliance's efforts to promote the five promises through the Kiwanis small grants program for the citizens of Arlington who wish to sponsor aligned projects. By sponsoring these projects these citizens become the most important asset for our youth—caring adults. Current board members include:

• Jim Walther, Board Chairperson, North Star Kiwanis (j.walther@sbcglobal.net)
• Mike Leathers, Vice Chair, Arlington Kiwanis (mike@mikeleathers.com)
• Amir Ajami, Vice Chair, Southwest Kiwanis (ajamigroup@aol.com)
• Ron White, Board Member North Star Kiwanis (ronwfs@tx.rr.com)
• Gene Tennison, Board Member, Sundown Kiwanis (gene.tennison@edwardjones.com)
• Ray Furtner, Board Member, Six Flags Kiwanis (kimurfurtn@aol.com)
• Bill Gilmore, Board Member, the City of Arlington (gilmoreb@ci.arlington.tx.us)
• Betty Krohn, Board Member, AISD (bkrohn@aisd.net)
• Ted McIlvain, Board Member, Faith-based entities (tmcilvain@arlingtonmethodist.org)
• Carolyn McHenry, Board Member, Non-profit (mchenrycarolyn@aol.com)
• Shirley Theriot, Community Service Learning Advisor, UT Arlington (theriot@uta.edu)
• Jerry Cooper, Public Affairs Advisor. North Star Kiwanis (jcooper5064@earthlink.net)
• Phil Porter, Social Work Advisor, Arlington Kiwanis (philporter817@att.net)
• Raul Gonzalez, Optimist Liaison, Optimist Club of Arlington (gonzalezr@passmanjones.com)

The Alliance serves as an information clearing center for ideas on how to make our city one of the best cities in the nation for young people. This is accomplished by circulating a weekly newsletter containing the America's Promise Bulletin, by sponsoring or participating in workshops, and by providing helpful content on this website.

The Arlington Alliance for Youth is a 501(c) (3) not-for-profit organization funded by contributions from Kiwanis Clubs and both corporate and individual donors. Corporations with a community focus are encouraged to support the Alliance, its small grant program, and other activities by making contributions to the Alliance and by appointing employees and mangers to represent them by volunteering to serve with youth agencies, non-profits, Kiwanis Clubs, PTAs, or City services or government.

 Sponsoring Kiwanis Clubs