We founded the Youth Organizing Community of Practice (YOCOP) with a vision of young people in New Hampshire at the forefront of transforming culture and policy, grounded in the values of voice, action, equity and love. We identified and funded six organizations in our launch in January 2020 to:

• Convene and catalyze the field of youth organizing in the state of NH
• Build transformative relationships between the staff of groups in the field
• Strengthen the foundational youth leadership and organizing practices of groups in the field 

Our purpose: YOCOP convenes the staff of youth organizing groups in NH to build relationships, mutual support and solidarity, in order to strengthen the organizing power of each group and the field of youth organizing in NH as a whole. YOCOP member groups are organizing young people who are primarily in middle school through mid-20s, with historically targeted identities at the center.The Cornerstones of Youth Organizing (YO) that guide us are:

• Youth leadership: young people decide what the group will work on and develop leadership skills to execute that work
• Organizing for Power: activate a base of young people who make change by understanding an issue that impacts them and deploying campaigns to win solutions 
• Movement building: collaboration with other groups in order to contribute to a bigger movement
• Systemic change lens: looking at the root causes of issues, such as systemic racism and other ‘isms