Transforming and Strengthening Youth-Serving Ecosystems to Achieve Scale

The Building Ecosystems for Youth Opportunity (BEYO) initiative, launched by the Aspen Institute Forum for Community Solutions in partnership with Jobs for the Future (JFF) in 2021, set out to support eight innovative OYF collaboratives across the country in scaling evidence-based, high-quality pathways to postsecondary completion and careers for opportunity youth.  

With primary support from JPMorgan Chase & Co. and additional support from Prudential Financial and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the Aspen Forum invested a total of $1.6 million in these collaboratives in order to support deepening and scaling pathways that improve postsecondary and career success of opportunity youth, while at the same time strengthening local youth-serving ecosystems to support this population more effectively. Additionally, collaboratives in the BEYO portfolio received technical assistance and coaching from JFF and the Aspen Forum. 

The initiative’s objectives were threefold:

• Expand proven pathways that connect opportunity youth to postsecondary education and family-sustaining careers.
• Strengthen local youth-serving ecosystems by building collaborative capacity across schools, employers, postsecondary institutions, and community organizations.
• Inform the field by capturing lessons learned and scaling strategies to guide future investments and policy change.

Over four years, BEYO communities met these objectives by scaling, replicating and expanding existing pathways; putting in place new innovative reconnection programs; securing state funding streams for postsecondary support programs; and advancing statewide legislature aimed at preventing disconnection from school.  

This report documents strategies for success that communities undertook to achieve these important wins, while also outlining enduring and transferable lessons that Aspen and JFF believe can inform other efforts – including by local collaboratives, national intermediaries, and philanthropy – to further scale promising pathways to postsecondary and career success that are still elusive for millions of young adults nationwide.

This work was made possible by the generous support and thoughtful partnership of JPMorgan Chase & Co. The authors are also grateful to our BEYO community partners and young leaders who generously shared their insights, experiences and knowledge that make up the core of this report.