From Ideas to Impact: Launching the Next Phase of Youth Civic Infrastructure
An intern and community members work on a composting program through a Youth Civic Infrastructure partnership between the Aldo Leopold Charter School and the Upper Gila Watershed Alliance. Photo by Upper Gila Watershed Alliance.
Behind a table of colorful vegetables from his school’s farmers market, a middle school student explains why every neighborhood deserves access to healthy food as he bags tomatoes and hands them to customers.
In a conference room nearby, a high schooler presents a proposal for restoring the Gila Watershed – a watershed that has sustained life for generations of New Mexicans. She has a plan for using mycelium networks to filter pollutants, stabilize eroding soil, and absorb excess nutrients. At the end of her talk, hands shoot up with questions from her audience of scientists and community members who want to help.
At Future Focused Education, we believe schools should serve as anchors of healthy, thriving communities, where students learn by addressing real-world challenges in their communities. Through our Youth Civic Infrastructure (YCI) initiative, and in partnership with the McCune Charitable Foundation, schools and nonprofit organizations work side by side with students to lead meaningful change. Through YCI, students across New Mexico are mentoring younger youth, launching businesses, strengthening food systems, improving environmental health, and creating solutions for the challenges they experience every day. These examples, from the farmers market to the watershed proposal, illustrate what happens when schools become places where young people learn by directly improving the communities they call home.
Vegetables grown by students at Polk Agricultural Academy, cleaned and readied for the market, thanks to a YCI partnership with the New Mexico Farmers' Marketing Association. Photo by Polk Agricultural Academy.
During the 2025-2026 school year, Future Focused’s 12 Exploration Grants brought together schools and nonprofit organizations to design youth-led capstone projects rooted in local priorities. Together these partnerships created new opportunities for students to engage in meaningful community-based learning while laying the foundation for paid internships, career pathways, and long-term collaboration.
Through these grants, students launched capstone projects addressing food justice, environmental stewardship, youth well-being, entrepreneurship, Indigenous leadership and healthcare innovation.
The creativity, commitment, and leadership demonstrated by students, educators, and nonprofit partners through these initial YCI grants have started a statewide movement. Now it’s time for the next phase: implementation.
Students from Española Valley High School design vibration gloves for people living with Parkinson’s disease through a YCI partnership between Española GloveWorks and Northern New Mexico College. Photo by Santa Fe New Mexican.
Growing Solutions Across New Mexico
We are excited to announce our 2026-2027 Youth Civic Infrastructure Implementation Grant recipients. Four partnerships have been selected to receive three-year grants of $50,000 annually, while two additional partnerships will receive one-year implementation grants to expand innovative school-community collaborations across New Mexico.
Each partnership reflects the unique strengths and aspirations of its community.
- Fundamental Needs & Kirtland Central High School are cultivating Native youth leadership through entrepreneurship, mentoring, and community-driven solutions that strengthen well-being across generations.
- New Mexico Farmers' Marketing Association & Polk Agricultural Academy are advancing community food sovereignty through Semillas to Market, where students will launch a school farmers market, earn industry certifications, and explore careers in agriculture and local food systems.
- River Source is connecting students from West Las Vegas High School and Mandela International Magnet School to watershed restoration and environmental research that protects New Mexico's natural resources while opening pathways into green careers.
- Upper Gila Watershed Alliance & Aldo Leopold Charter School are engaging students in composting, climate resilience, and intergenerational environmental stewardship that benefits both schools and the broader community.
- Ngage New Mexico & Mayfield High School are expanding inclusive paid internships and career-connected learning for students with disabilities, English Learners, and students experiencing housing instability.
- Española Gloveworks & Española Valley High School are bringing together engineering, healthcare, and entrepreneurship as students design technologies that improve the lives of people living with Parkinson's disease.
Although each community-school partnership looks different, they share a common purpose: creating opportunities for young people to contribute to something larger than themselves.
Behind the table of vegetables and the plans for watershed restoration, a clear shift is happening: students are no longer waiting for permission to lead. They are already here, learning, building, and solving alongside adults. When schools are integrated into community life, the results are as tangible and vital as fresh food and clean water, right in our own backyards.
Students from Polk Agricultural Academy get into the straw pile to spread it on their garden beds. Photo by Polk Agricultural Academy.
Investing in youth is investing in community
None of this happens without partnership. We are deeply grateful to the philanthropic partners who recognize that lasting community change begins by investing in young people. Their support makes it possible for schools and nonprofit organizations to build reciprocal partnerships that connect learning with community priorities and create opportunities for students to lead with purpose. Youth Civic Infrastructure is made possible by generous funders:
- Albuquerque Community Foundation
- Anchorum
- Annie E. Casey Foundation
- Bernalillo County Commissioner Frank Baca
- Community Foundation of Southern New Mexico
- Cricket Island Foundation
- Las Vegas Community Foundation
- McCune Charitable Foundation
- New Mexico Community Trust
- Ressia Foundation
- United Way of North Central New Mexico
- Wells Fargo
- W.K. Kellogg Foundation
As Future Focused Education launches the next round of $25,000 Exploration Grants, we invite additional funders to join us in expanding this movement. Our goal is to raise $150,000 to support six new partnerships across New Mexico.