The Youth Police Initiative is a program aimed at improving relations between community members and officers in place to protect them. The nationwide program has one standout student from New York: Tahleeya Raphael, a Poughkeepsie High School junior that wants to better understand and help people.

That’s why she’s involved in the school’s Youth Police Initiative program.

Raphael traveled to Boston to represent more than 5,000 high school students to better relate to police officers.

“She’s the one that gave me the opportunity to be in national YPI,” said Raphael as she rooted through her locker, pulling out certificates and pointing to a photo from her experiences with the program.

In January, she was one of seven students, nationally selected of 5,500, to travel to Boston for the chance to have an open conversation with officers.

“Hello, my name is Tahleeya … this is our seventh recommendation: community policing,” she said on an audition tape of her practicing her portion of the presentation they’ll share with the rest of the organization.

She represented thousands on why they believe should be included in the conversation.

“We’re the future, and we deserve a chance and a choice in things that police are doing,” said Raphael during the presentation. “Most people my age do not like police at all, I don’t think. Because I grew up … well, I’m still in the hood, but I grew up in the hood, you know what I mean? Calling the police on someone … you’re weak, and that’s just the truth,” said Raphael.

After taking criminology and psychology courses, she says she wants to help reverse that.

“I like them, or I’m not against them or anything. But to me, they’re just people,” Raphael said.

Repairing a relationship is a two-way street.

Jon Geuss is a former patrol officer turned first-year student resource officer who plans to join the program next year after learning its impact.

“For people to sit down in a structured environment, or unstructured, but to just sit down together … that right there starts to bridge a gap. And so I was just like … the fact that that was happening, it just sounds like a great program to me,” said Geuss.