Message from Kristin McGuire

I’m excited to share YI’s Power Playbook with you. It’s the culmination of almost a year’s worth of work that will guide Young Invincibles for the next three years.

We started this process with a familiar vision – to boldly go where no one has gone before. A nod to not only Star Trek, but to our values of Bold Ideas, Community, Young Adult Power, Equity, and Collaboration. The task was to create a strategic direction for YI that gets us from our current conditions as young adults to a step closer to attaining our vision that “All young people fully participate in our nation’s political process and have the economic opportunity to reach their fullest potential.”

As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said,

“Power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose. It is the strength required to bring about social, political and economic change.”

That’s the point of The Power Playbook. We believe that this will not only guide our policy work, but also helps us center the joy, or play, in our work to advance economic opportunity. It will elevate and achieve our purpose.

The Power Playbook will guide us through the next three years of Young Invincibles. It will strengthen our internal operations, help grow our community engagement, and embolden our policy and research. We won’t hit all of our goals immediately, and that’s okay because change takes time.

I want to give thanks to our Strategic Planning Committee. I’m proud of you and the staff at large for investing the time and serious thought into this collective project. Thank you to our many partners and former staff who provided input. We are grateful for your insight. Thank you to the Annie E. Casey Foundation for their organizational effectiveness support on this project, as well as the Molina Family Foundation that provided general operating support, and many other contributions. Lastly, I want to express my deep gratitude to the young adults who participated for your vision and your continued insight. Thank you for helping us hold the line and stay focused, for always reminding us why we are here and who we are accountable to.

This would not have been successful without each of you. And don’t get me wrong, it hasn’t been easy. We’ve had some tough conversations. We’ve disagreed. We’ve agreed. We’ve celebrated. And I think that’s what I am proud of the most; that we were able to get through the hard stuff to achieve something great. For that, we will be a better YI.

My hope is that this document inspires you and your work. I hope it provides vision and guidance. I hope it excites you.

With that, it is with great pride and gratitude that I present to the YI Network, inclusive of all young adults in this country- whether you have participated in our programming or not, our staff, our partners, and to the “Young at Heart ‘’ Invincibles, the Power Playbook. I am excited for you to explore it and make it your own. As you do so, I hope you begin to see yourself and your work within the following pages.

The task at hand is the work of all of us. Young people will not be ignored

Mission

Young Invincibles’ mission is to amplify the voices of young adults in the political process and expand economic opportunity for our generation.

Vision

All young people fully participate in our nation’s political process and have the economic opportunity to reach their fullest potential.