For 37 years, the Dynamy John S. Laws Youth Academy has done something extraordinary.

It has empowered first-generation college students, immigrant students, and other underserved young people see a future that may have felt beyond their reach. It has provided mentorship, opportunity, guidance, and a community that believed in them when the world often overlooked them.

And now, after 37 years of transforming lives, it is being taken away.

This week, Seven Hills Foundation announced that the Dynamy Youth Academy will close after graduating its current senior class this coming Friday.

In a single announcement, dedicated staff were given weeks to rebuild their careers, while 48 students were left wondering who would help them build their futures. Today, they are being told that path may disappear before they reach the finish line.

Students who were promised guidance.

Students who were promised mentors.

Students who were promised a community that believed in them.

For many people, a college access program may sound like a service.

For us, it was a lifeline.

Dynamy was never just about college applications. It was about belonging. It was about having someone tell you that your dreams mattered. It was about exposing students to campuses, careers, and possibilities beyond the limits of what they had known.

Dynamy opened up our world.

It gave us opportunities we never would have had otherwise. It helped us discover parts of our identities, what we were capable of, and where we belonged. It gave us reparative adult relationships. It gave us a safe community to grow, ask questions, and dream bigger.

For nearly four decades, Dynamy has transformed lives across Worcester. The college graduates, teachers, nurses, social workers, business owners, and community leaders who came through this program are living proof of its impact.

Their success did not happen by accident.

It happened because someone invested in them.

It happened because this program existed.

Today, we are left asking a difficult question:

At a time when so many students are already wondering whether college is even possible for them, why are we taking away the people and programs that help them believe it is?

A community loses more than a program when a program like this disappears.

It loses opportunity.

It loses hope.

It loses future success stories that may never get the chance to be written.

It loses a pathway to equity. 

We call on Seven Hills Foundation, community leaders, donors, alumni, parents, and residents of Worcester to explore every possible option to save the Dynamy John S. Laws Youth Academy.

If this program changed your life, speak up.

If you believe every student deserves access to opportunity, speak up.

If you believe that 37 years of impact is worth fighting for, speak up.

The doors that Dynamy opened for us should not be closed behind us, or ahead of us.

For more info on the Dynamy John S. Laws Youth Academy: https://www.sevenhills.org/programs/dynamy-jsl-academy 

What can you do?
- Share this petition urgently and widely. 
https://www.change.org/save-dynamy-youth-academy

-Email Dr. Kathleen M. Jordan, President & CEO of Seven Hills Foundation, at kjordan@sevenhills.org and call 508.983.1301 to ask for a written pause on closing the Dynamy John S. Laws Youth Academy for Worcester students.

-Alum- please share how Dynamy impacted your life in a comment below ❤️