"Reality Changers" founder conveys hope for teens

By ADRIENNE A. AGUIRRE

A ministry of the Hispanic Presbyterian Church of San Diego, "Reality Changers" was founded in May 2001 by UC San Diego graduate Christopher Yanov, 28. After working with gang members for 5 years, he realized it doesn't do any good to teach teenagers to say åNoπ to things like drugs, violence and sex without giving them something to say åYesπ to like higher education and Jesus Christ.

≥Gang membership is a default culture,≤ he said. ≥They do it because thereπs nothing else to do.≤

Yanov said, while program participants have to agree to abstain from sex, drugs and gangs, aside from a random drug tests once a year, negative activities donπt get the attention in his program.

≥They know drugs are wrong, they know gangs are wrong,≤ he said. ≥We donπt have to tell them again and again.≤

Yanov said while drug, crime and pregnancy prevention arenπt the purpose of the program, they naturally become the result when teenagers have something to live for.

≥In six years, the first 108 students that passed through the program have never tested positive for drugs,≤ he said.

The program currently has 83 students. The North County site at Solana Beach Presbyterian Church is looking for more students. The original site in downtown San Diego has a waiting list of more than 30 students working to make personal changes so they can be accepted into the program.

Yanov, who is also a substitute teacher, said what he looks for in prospective Reality Changers members are students who have the potential and the desire to change their lives and just need the opportunity.

The students are the first in their families to attend college. Many will be the first to graduate high school, he said, while some are the first to get to high school.

Yanov said he wants to cure, what he calls, ≥Inner-city Syndrome,≤ when socioeconomically-disadvantaged children desperately want out of their drug-and-violence-infested environments — but believe thatπs life because thatπs all they see.

≥If they are exposed to people who are shot and killed all the time, then that is their reality,≤ he said. ≥None of these teenagers knew a college student before the program, so we try to turn that around.≤

For more information, call (619) 232-1998 or go to www.realitychangers.org.