Dialog reporter
Brother-sister team of Patrick and Jane Lyons start nonprofit to give incarcerated youth a second chance
WILMINGTON — Growing up in a stable, two-parent home in a comfortable Wilmington suburb, Patrick and Jane Lyons could be forgiven if they ignored a population living close by but in a totally different reality. But that’s not the way the siblings were raised.
“Our parents were never ones to let us sit around,” Patrick said.
So last year, Patrick, now a senior at Salesianum School, and Jane, an Ursuline Academy freshman, co-founded Youth Overcoming Obstacles, an initiative designed to assist young people prepare for life after incarceration at the cottages at Ferris School, Delaware’s juvenile detention facility near Prices Corner. Patrick said there are resources available to help adults transitioning back into society and to prevent recidivism, but not really anything for juveniles.
“If you can nip things in the bud right here and now, why aren’t we doing that so it’s not a problem down the road?” Patrick asked.
For her efforts, Jane Lyons was recognized last month as a distinguished finalist by the Prudential Spirit of Community awards. The program honors young people for “outstanding acts of volunteerism.”
The pair began to organize YOO, including raising money and gathering resources. Jane wrote local businesses seeking support, and their parents – dad Garrett, a dentist, and mom Patricia, a former real-estate lawyer – helped out. With the seed money, they staged a guest bartender night at a local watering hole and have since raised more than $9,000.
Patrick, who will play lacrosse next year at the University of North Carolina, said they already have seen their effort bear fruit. The first person helped was a mother from Wilmington who wanted to move her family out of its crime-ridden neighborhood. Youth Overcoming Obstacles was able to help out in finding her a new place to live and with the first month’s rent.
Some of the money raised will be used to help set the Ferris inmates secure work once they are released. Often, these young people do not have clothes to wear to a job interview, for example, or they don’t have the right connections.
“Kind of what we thought about when we talked to the people over at the cottages at Ferris is a lot of these kids will go back right into the same situation they were in before, and if they could get a little bit of money, go to the football camp at their school, get them out of their community a little bit, maybe that could, in some way, keep them out of trouble,” Patrick said.
“These kids aren’t bad kids,” he continued. “We talk to them. They’re just like (Jane) and I. They need a second chance. We’ve gotten second chances before. You make a stupid mistake, it happens. If we can help in that a little bit, even just talking to them … it could lead to something else and could completely change their lives.”
A lot of the young people getting out of Ferris don’t have a support system, Jane said. YOO could help give that to them.
“Patrick and I have been fortunate to grow up with a backbone. Basically, if we make a mistake, our parents will always be there to help us fix it. But a lot of these kids don’t have that,” she said.
Working together ‘a given’
The siblings, members of St. Joseph on the Brandywine Parish, were influenced by their older brother, Garrett, who spent three years in the Teach for America program. He would talk about how difficult it was to engage some of his students because they were working one or two jobs after school to help pay the bills, then arriving the next morning on three hours of sleep.
Patrick also recalled a talk at Salesianum about mass incarceration. He spoke about it with his family, and from that, YOO was born. He and Jane decided to work on the project together. The youngest of five children, they have grown up especially close to one another and figured two minds would be better than one.
“Working together, I think it was just a given,” Jane said. “Whatever we were going to do, we would do together.”
They went to work contacting local businesses, persevering when responses were slow, and Youth Overcoming Obstacles has grown. On March 20, the organization is sponsoring a road race on the Wilmington riverfront. Information is available at www.youthoo.com.
Patrick isn’t sure how much assistance he will be able to offer YOO once he departs for Chapel Hill, N.C., but he said he will do what he can. He will likely major in finance, but he knows community service will be a part of his life. During an internship with Bank of America last summer, he attended a talk by someone who talked about the social responsibility of America’s banks. That resonated with him.
He said he can’t imagine having spent his high school years anywhere but Salesianum. “With Sallies, it sounds a little cliché, you come in a young boy, and by the time you graduate, you’ve kind of become a young man.”
He also praised his theology classes and said they were his most challenging. “The faith aspect of my life has grown a lot at Salesianum.”
Jane has three-plus years remaining at Ursuline, but she already feels at home. She played varsity field hockey in the fall, is a member of the state championship swim team and plans on playing lacrosse in the spring. Her fellow Raiders are like family.
“I am closer with them than I have ever been with anyone in middle school, anyone in lower school. I can’t imagine by senior year how close we’re going to be,” she said.
