South Bend native taking 40 underprivileged teens overseas

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SOUTH BEND, Ind. -

“A lot of these children have never even been outside of their city,” said Claudia White, Founder of Youth Global Perspectives.

Claudia White is a woman on a mission. A Washington High School grad, she’s traveled across the world and started her own organization at the age of 26, Youth Global Perspectives.

The title of her non-profit simply spells out her mission. She wants to expose kids to the world, so she’s planning to take 40 teens from South Bend and Indianapolis on a trip to Washington D.C. and then Spain for two weeks.

“Serves low-income household children. Pretty much children that are not privileged and we take them on local, national, and international trips,” said White.

She’s an eighth grade, Indianapolis teacher by day, but spends all of her spare time on her organization. White says her idea sparked from her own childhood memories.

“I was that child that I teach now. I didn’t have the opportunity to travel all these different places, there was no organizations that were taking me on trips,” said White.

But white says it’s not all fun and games. In fact, the whole purpose is to help her hometown teens gain cultural awareness. They have to raise funds using techniques and ideas White helps them come up with as well as the organizations website. White says it's all a part of a gainful learning process that she thinks will help teens like Bruce White.

“My dad’s like locked up so I didn’t have a lot of opportunities to go nowhere, because my mom was struggling so I couldn’t just go to different states just for fun. I’m like, ‘I need to buckle down and get it together because I wanna go see places too,’ so that’s what made me get my grades up,” said Bruce White, a high school junior.

He says her message is sinking in.

“Her perspective and having that around me, opened my eyes too,” said Bruce White.

If you’re interested in Youth Global Perspectives, click here for their website.

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