Who We Are
Our Founder & Executive Director
When Isis Sapp-Grant founded the Youth Empowerment Mission, Inc. in 1995, it was the first community-run and gender-specific program designed as an alternative to incarceration in New York City.
The organization has since provided vital services to over 800 youth and families in crisis. Over the past 17 years, Isis has spoken to thousands of young people, families, leaders and law enforcement workers in an effort to save lives and inspire positive change. Isis has been a guest lecturer at Harvard, Cornell, and Clark Atlanta University as well as visited countless public secondary schools throughout the country to spread her message of empowerment. A former gang member during her adolescence She has created a system that inspires youths, and adults, to move forward and reclaim their lives.
Isis is a wife and mother of two beautiful children; she is a community leader, advocate, teacher, speaker, mentor, student and friend. Mrs. Sapp-Grant has been awarded the Robinhood Heroes Award and the Union Square Award. In November of 2007 she was recognized by Ebony Magazine and the makers of Pine Sol for her work with young women and girls across the country, and most recently, she was recognized as one of Brooklyn’s Extraordinary Women by Kings County District Attorney Charles Hynes and Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum for Women’s History Month. She is a true visionary who has learned to share her gift: a second chance at life.
Isis holds a Bachelor’s of Arts degree from Fisk University and a Master’s of Social Work from New York University.
