Downtown Youth Center - YMCA of Greater Birmingham

It’s time to announce our Pumpkin Contest Winners!

Drum roll pleaseeee 🥁
at the time of completion of the contest

1st place from Ms. Trenita’s and Ms. Tre’s class with 573 votes Bella’s Very Hungry Caterpillar

1st place from Ms. Kawanna’s and Ms. K’s class with 535 votes Ryleigh’s Cinderella Pumpkin

1st place from Ms. Mica’s and Ms. Endya’s class with 398 votes Ayden’s Trick or Pete

Thank you to everyone who took the time out to vote! 🗳️ 🎃

Glowing through the rest of the week! Check out scenes from our Halloween extreme dodgeball competition 😎

We are nearing the end of October so you know what that means, it’s time for our annual book character voting contest!
Our PreK friends did such an A-MAZING job on their character pumpkins, we are so proud! In fact they did so well that we simply cannot choose our favorite, so we’ll let you be the judge!


How do you vote? The numbers are located in the caption of each picture, find your favorite pumpkin and hit the LIKE or LOVE button to record your vote. Once you’ve voted please share the post with your family and friends so they too can get it on the fun!

PLEASE keep in mind that all votes will need to be liked on this original post in order to be counted.

Voting will end on Thursday October 31st at Noon and the winner will be announced on Friday Nov 1.

*ONLY ONE VOTE per each account will be counted.

Happy Voting!!

We are grateful for the opportunity to make an impact on the students in Birmingham City Schools through our Youth in Government Program. We are grateful to the Birmingham Bar Association for partnering with us to implement their Students Today Lawyers Tomorrow Mock Trial program. We owe a huge deal of gratitude to Presidening Judge Elisabeth French for allowing us to be in her courtroom and others. Judge Javan Patton, Judge Carole Smitherman and Judge Jim Hughey all presided over mock trials while encouraging students from Parker, Woodlawn, Jackson Olin and Ramsay. We thank all of the attorneys who worked with the students, teachers who worked tirelessly and Birmingham School Board members who came out to support. The students did amazing! Congratulations to Woodlawn High who came in 1st Place and Ramsay for placing 2nd. Competition was tight and all of the scores were only point in difference from each other. We thank all of the parents who came out as well. Success starts here!

Our YMCA Youth in Government students from A.H. Parker and Ramsay High Schools represented the YMCA and Birmingham City Schools this weekend at Spain Park High School for Regional Mock Trials. We are super excited to have had 3 Judges appointed from Ramsay and 3 Judges appointed from Parker. Their bailiffs also came from their respective schools. Parker had one competition team to compete in the trials. Thank you to every teacher and attorney who worked with the students to make it possible. Leadership starts here!

8 weeks have come and gone! Things looked a little different this summer..it was definitely a little louder! Two camps one family!!

Introducing our campers and counselors of the week! Everybody! Everyone made it to the end, stepped out of their comfort zone. Made new friends and tried new things!

Let’s say we meet back here for the 2025 camp season! Be sure to lookout for information around January/February!

See ya next year 😎✌🏾❤️

It’s time to announce our overall group of the summer! 🥁🥁🥁🥁🥁

Theeee : VOYAGERS (1st/2nd grade)

We want to thank our friends at 205 ICE, Shaved Ice for keeping us cool 😎🍧 every Friday this past eight weeks!!

We appreciate you!!

What’s fun without a little color?

Sorry it was a pure battlefield with our older group so we unfortunately don’t have any pictures BUT trust us they had a great time!

Sounds from today “pure joy and plenty thank you for doing this for us”

If you were on Richard Arrington at some point today and saw clouds of foam…yeahhhh that was us! 😎We hope these are the moments they always remember as we soak up final days of the 2024 camp season ❤️

*pictures are in order from Voyagers-TEENS

On Monday, Wednesday and Friday you can catch us as one on the gym floor partaking in our opening ceremony which includes plenty of competition.

However on Tuesday and Thursday our campers are partaking in character development with their counselors!

Today Mr. Zebo taught our 5th/6th grade boys the correct way to tie a tie!
Ms. Bre talked to our 5th/6th grade girls about how they see themselves and then taught them how to properly lay their edges. Then there was Ms. Kenedi with her 3rd/4th graders, they made paper chain affirmation links! We hope these are moments our campers carry with them always! ❤️

That’s a wrap for this year’s cosmetology class! For a lot of these young ladies this completes their second year with Tavares.

This year the camp was 4 weeks and they were taught how to flat iron/press hair, basic cornrolls, braid hair with commercial hair , and how to properly apply nail polish and create designs. Thank you to Tavares Gilbert of TBT Hair De’Zign Studio and his team for showing up year after year for our young ladies!

Check out some then v. now photos (green table cloth)! 💇🏾‍♀️💆🏾‍♀️

We’ve had a busy week, check out these photos from the week and be sure to go back to see photos from earlier this week.

We can’t believe we’re rounding the bases and entering the home stretch of the 2024 camp season! No worries though we still have two weeks worth of fun left! 😎

It’s Fridayyyyy and also time to announce our campers of the week!! **In no particular standing order **

🥁🥁🥁🥁

Voyagers
Trinity
Kiley
Ace
Harmoni

Pathfinders
Dekel
Lauren
Kylie
Riley
Fatoumata

Navigators
Camryn
Aubrey
Karson

TEENS
Nakhi

Counselor/Staff Person
Mr. Jarred
Mrs. Tiffica

Group
After three weeks we have a NEW champ!
Pathfinders