Most of the fellows are no stranger to community advocacy, most are already part of groups around the city dedicated to community service.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Samora, for example, is part of Project WORTH, a teen development program within the city\u2019s health department focused on mental health, which is where she first heard about the UP Partnership fellowship.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The inaugural cohort is made up of 20 young people who were selected from more than 100 applicants from all over the Bexar County region, and represent several public school districts and higher education institutions. Two of the group\u2019s members are recent college graduates.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Leona Daniel-Fletcher, 18, is a marketing and management freshman at Texas A&M University-San Antonio who joined Leaders of Tomorrow because she\u2019s passionate about giving young people a larger platform and equity in education.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/DSC02175.jpg\")
Leona Daniel-Fletcher (second from the left) is part of a fellowship of young people getting paid for civic engagement, an initiative from UP Partnership meant to influence local leaders into investing more in youth and education services. Credit: Courtesy \/ UP Partnership<\/p>\n
\u201c[The program] gives us the opportunity to talk about different things, and decrease the fear of stepping into different rooms with different people of different ages and say what\u2019s on our minds,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
UP Partnership expects the fellows to create policy recommendations and plans to put those recommendations in front of the public by the end of the year-long program.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The fellowship is not the first time UP Partnership has tried to influence elected officials in hopes of diverting more public funds and resources for youth services.\u00a0<\/p>\n
During the city\u2019s charter review last year<\/a>, UP Partnership tried to get a proposal in front of voters that would\u2019ve asked them if they wanted to reserve 20% of the city\u2019s budget for youth services.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n City leaders didn\u2019t go for it, but that hasn\u2019t dampened the nonprofit\u2019s resolve.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI think one of the things that we learned [during the charter review] was how important it is to really bring the people that are most impacted by the challenges we seek to address to the table,\u201d Martinez said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Using a \u201ccivic influencer model\u201d through the fellowship program, UP Partnership hopes it can inch closer to its ultimate goal: unlocking $330 million in public funding for youth services and increasing post-secondary enrollment in the region to 70% by 2030.\u00a0<\/p>\n While UP focuses on preserving current youth services given recent budget cut discussions at the city,<\/a> there are some signs residents are paying more attention to youth and education issues.\u00a0<\/p>\n Earlier this week, Samora went to a county commissioners\u2019 meeting in support of a proclamation by County Judge Peter Sakai recognizing Sept. 22-26 as \u201cHigh School Voter Registration Week\u201d in Bexar County.\u00a0<\/p>\n A recent survey asking San Antonio residents to rank where they\u2019d like public dollars to go for the 2026 fiscal year<\/a> puts youth services as 12th out of a list of 20. For the 2025 fiscal year<\/a> survey, youth services ranked 18th.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/UPPartnership_16_07.16.25_AmberEsparza.jpg\")
Hand drawn signs from the \u2018Youth Voice Panel\u2019, created during UP Partnership\u2019s Future Ready Practitioner Conference in 2024, lines the outside of the UP conference room. Credit: Amber Esparza for the San Antonio Report<\/p>\n