Our Story
Teacher Aaron Vetter would hear his students recounting stories of their weekend game. And while he was honored to listen, he noticed the reaction of children who didn’t have the same experiences, and his heart broke for what they were missing. The children whose parents couldn’t afford extras like sports or music or dance lessons, didn’t do as well in school and lacked confidence in comparison to their peers.
CITY: a center of population and its people.
City Youth Matrix is a product of one man trying to offer equal opportunities to more children.
The barriers to extra-curricular activities are more than money and transportation. Generational poverty meant that parents who didn’t experience after school activities didn’t pursue them for their children.
As a coach and mentor, Aaron gave his time to guiding parents and suggesting activities. He knew he could make a difference for some children, but it wasn’t enough, and so he founded City Youth Matrix in 2018.
City Youth Matrix began by offering transportation and scholarships to low income children and their families to attend activities like gymnastics, basketball, ice skating, karate and dance. Family liaisons helped guide parents through registration and volunteer drivers got everyone there and back safely. CYM developed a Family Empowerment Program when they realized that the parents didn’t have a support system. It wasn’t long before CYM was recruiting liaisons and drivers, because they had found a niche that no other Frederick County nonprofit filled.
YOUTH: the period of life during which you are a child, before you are a fully mature adult.
Fast forward to the Spring of 2020 and the worldwide pandemic and the shut downs that led to virtual school. Founder Aaron Vetter knew his Matrix parents didn’t have the spare income to provide meaningful activities for their children who lived under stay at home orders. He created the concept of a “Bucket of Hope” and purchased art, music, STEM and physical education supplies and delivered them to families in a 5-gallon buckets. He included games to increase the bonding time the family could spend together. The concept of the bucket received social media attention and soon CYM began supplying them to the clients of other nonprofits. In the first six months of the Buckets of Hope program over 700 buckets were distributed and 1,400 children benefitted.
MATRIX: the environment or context in which something such as a society develops and grows.
Today, City Youth Matrix offers its original scholarship and transportation services, and the Family Empowerment Program.
City Youth Matrix continues to meet the needs of elementary, middle and high school students and their families. We will be here for them through their youth.