Florida Regional Impact Award - The FLITE Center

Broward County, Fla – On June 26, at its annual conference in Orlando, Leadership Florida presented The FLITE Center with its 2016 Florida Regional Impact Award, recognizing their success as a central resource for young people aging out of foster care in Broward County.

When you’ve been a part of the Broward County foster care system, you look forward to your 18th birthday with a mixture of excitement and concern. Excitement because on that day you become a legal adult, fully responsible for your own future. Concern for exactly the same reason. Youth aging out of the foster care system are low-income and at risk of many challenges and barriers to success and independence.

The FLITE Center (Fort Lauderdale Independence, Training & Education), was created in 2009 with the intent of increasing support and access to services for the youth aging out of foster care. Services range from assistance with education, affordable housing and employment to life skills that include budgeting, interviewing, healthy relationships, etc. in a nurturing environment that promotes personal growth. The FLITE Center strives to ensure that this fragile population develops essential skills to begin building their lives as productive, self sufficient members of the community.

While The FLITE Center began as a one-stop resource center concept, it quickly began playing a significant role in oversight of the entire system of care as it relates to Transitional Independent Living youth in Broward County. The programs and services provided at The FLITE Center have created statewide awareness and recognition of a well developed and successful model that multiple agencies have inquired about replicating.

Leadership Florida established the Florida Regional Impact Award to recognize a business or non-profit organization that has created a specific project or body of work whose impact is currently transforming the future of its region and has the potential to transform Florida as a whole. It was formed to promote a heightened sense of appreciation for the possibilities available when Floridians work together as a single statewide community.

Leadership Florida is proud to honor the FLITE Center as its 2016 Florida Regional Impact Award winner.

For more information, contact Mercy Joy Corlew at mcorlew@leadershipflorida.org. To learn more about The FLITE Center visit www.flitecenter.org.

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About Leadership Florida

For thirty-five years, Leadership Florida has developed a reputation as a builder of a stronger, diverse statewide sense of community. A respected non-partisan convener of committed individuals, Leadership Florida enhances the knowledge and leadership abilities of Florida’s leaders through educational programs and by encouraging collaborative work for the betterment of our state. Leadership Florida provides Floridians essential information and a meaningful forum for their opinions and creates opportunities for shared experiences that are inviting, inspiring and of lasting value. Leadership Florida is a federally registered trademark.