Founded in 1980, the Annual Conference of Agencies and Organizations Serving Promising (formerly Troubled) Youth has always been, as the name indicates, an interagency and multidisciplinary meeting of professionals from education, the juvenile court, human services, juvenile justice, and public/private treatment resources who all provide services to children and youth, at-risk and under-resourced, who are experiencing educational, legal, behavioral, and/or mental health challenges.
Our Goal
The goal of the conference has always been to provide cutting-edge training and networking opportunities for professionals, primarily direct-service providers who work daily with youth. The average annual conference attendance is 700 attendees.
Our Funding
The Promising Youth Conference is funded primarily by registration fees; staffed by volunteers (the Conference Organizing Committee); and managed under the fiscal umbrella of Voices for Utah Children a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. The Conference Organizing Committee keeps the conference registration fee as low as possible to ensure that professionals working with youth will have the opportunity of attending and benefiting from this high-quality training and networking experience.
Fiscal Sponsors
The Promising Youth Conference Committee would like to express appreciation to ShelterKids, Inc. of Salt Lake County for 26 years of partnership and support. This partnership was integral to the continued success of our conference.
The committee would like to welcome Voices for Utah Children as our new sponsoring body and we look forward to this new association in our commitment to our helping professionals, youth and families.
Our History
Since 1990, the conference has been hosted at Snowbird Mountain Resort. We outgrew our previous venues and moved to accommodate the increased demand for participation.
Throughout our history, a mix of national and local presenters has been a hallmark of Promising Youth Conference with a constant quest of excellence. The conference presentations in some ways have always dealt with the perennial problems of youth struggling with negative influences in our world.
Topics have ranged from ADHD, substance abuse, adolescence, suicide, LGBTQ youth, human trafficking, restorative justice, and much more. While youth have challenges in any generation, now we seem to be increasingly optimistic about helping youth who have complex problems because the potential of the interventions available today are more likely to be successful, artful, positive and restorative than past interventions.
Interagency cooperation and interdisciplinary approaches to problem solving have remained core principles of the conference. Professionals serving Utah’s at-risk youth need to know each other, have a common knowledge base and speak the same professional language. Direct service providers, including line staff, counselors, therapists, teachers, probation officers, and case managers, have been the primary focus of the training and inspiration the conference presenters provide.
We care first and forever about professionals—in the trenches—who spend their days working directly with Utah’s youth.
