Our organization works to build community and provide avenues to keep bring youth together in order to keep them occupied and out of trouble. Over the past year we have hosted a basketball tournament at Lents Park in Portland and an indoor soccer tournament. SOWESCO also has a strong youth mentoring program that connects youth with caring volunteers. Mentors help youth to work through personal problems, homework assistance, and bridging the cultural gap between their home and school lives. The last is especially important because their parents, who were born and raised in Somalia, have a very different life experience than their children who have grown up in American culture. This creates intergenerational conflicts because of differing expectations of behavior. Mentors help youth to understand the place their parents are coming from in their expectations and how to communicate and work through these issues for mutual understanding. SOWESCO mentors schedule several sessions with individuals to best support them.