The Hilton Worldwide and the International Youth Foundation (IYF) today announced their commitment to create the Global Youth Wellbeing Index to monitor the state of young people and help increase the effectiveness and accountability of investments targeting youth. The joint commitment, titled “Investing in Youth: Global Youth Index & Plan for Business Impact,” was made at the Clinton Global Initiative 2012 Annual Meeting and will provide governments, business leaders and civil society organizations with tools to focus and measure their contributions to critical youth development issues.
While progress has been made, far greater resources are needed to meet the staggering challenges facing today’s young people effectively. By creating consensus among key stakeholders on a standard set of indicators to measure and track progress, IYF, with support from Hilton Worldwide, aims to attract increased investments in areas that demonstrate the greatest and most urgent youth needs.
“Leading companies invest in issues that impact their businesses and benefit from their unique resources and expertise,” said Christopher J. Nassetta, president and CEO, Hilton Worldwide. “As a growing employer of young people around the globe, youth are of critical importance to our bottom line and the future of our company. Hilton Worldwide is proud to join IYF in galvanizing greater investments for the youth development sector.”
As a complement to the Global Youth Wellbeing Index, Hilton Worldwide and IYF also announced their intent to create a Hospitality Industry Impact Framework, a tool that will help focus hospitality sector investments and provide a mechanism for reporting progress. IYF and Hilton Worldwide hope this framework will become a model for other industries and will unlock a new set of resources and expertise in support of the world’s young people.
“Going it alone is rarely the answer to addressing tough challenges” said William S. Reese, president and CEO, International Youth Foundation. “Together with Hilton Worldwide, we make this commitment with the goal of finding other business leaders, civil society organizations and government partners who will join us in developing these critically important tools to support young people and bring attention to the many challenges they face in their communities.”
In June 2012, Hilton Worldwide and IYF announced a $3 million, three-year partnership as part of Travel with Purpose, Hilton Worldwide’s promise to providing shared value to its business and communities around the globe. Today’s commitment to action is an extension of Hilton Worldwide’s existing work to create opportunities for youth globally, leveraging its industry expertise to help disadvantaged youth climb the “ladder of success” through expanded access to education as well as workforce and life skills training. The partnership is also a key component of IYF’s mission to prepare young people to be healthy, productive and engaged citizens.
Source: Hilton