Building Strong Communities

In East Oakland, fatal shootings, armed robberies, drug dealing, and teen prostitution are as common as corner liquor stores. Here, many youth, particularly young men of color, don’t finish high school. With few skills or job opportunities, some turn to drug dealing, crime and/or join gangs to survive, while others end up in detention centers, become teen parents or are homeless.  It's the same, 'hood to hood,' from FunkTown and the Murder Dubs, to the 30s and High Street, Seminary, 65/69, the Deep, North Oakland, South and West Berkeley, Richmond and San Pablo. 

Families, youth and entire apartment buildings and blocks are in crisis. They are dealing with poverty, lack of housing, poor health, addiction, depression and domestic violence. Our country's racist structures and unjust systems continue to cause harm to families most on the margin. In addition, some face language barriers and many lack education and are without social and emotional support.

With few positive role models, safe outlets and opportunities and underfunded schools, it’s no wonder so many youth are not doing well. Too many believe they have no real future.

Youth need consistent and positive role models, and productive after-school programs, activities and experiences that help build self-esteem and character, healthy relationships, and (re)connection to their communities. 

Youth need victories.  Young men and women in East Oakland do not experience enough victory in their lives.  Trybe Inc. exists to facilitate spaces where young people and families can get one win, believing that one victory begets another.  A string of victories creates a sustainability, where families experience enough good for an unbroken period of time to actually break vicious cycles of poverty, addiction, abuse, and violence.

Trybe serves youth with high needs by showing them they have a future—that they are our future.  Through healthy after-school clubs, mentoring, skills-building, leadership training and paid internship opportunities, and large community building events, Trybe helps shift youth lives in positive ways and nurtures indigenous leaders from within the community.

The mission of Trybe Inc. is to bring people together and provide meaningful spaces to connect and create beloved community.  Through opportunities to build and serve, Trybe works to create “ubuntu” spaces for people to be together, transforming communities from the bottom up.  Every person is brought into mission, to serve, and to build, and it is through these outward motions that people are served, strengthened, supported, and transformed, both for the ones serving and the ones being served.  It is with the consideration of the whole community, with a holistic view of each and every person, that Trybe approaches its activities.