For months, at least, Amanda Boaz knew somewhere in her subconscious that something wasn’t right.

But it took the Groton native until sometime in 2012 to realize the bad relationship she’d been in with her husband of four years wasn’t something she had to withstand.

With her newborn son at her side and whatever belongings she could fit in her car, Boaz called Safe Futures, scared and without a plan but certain it was the right move.

She had no idea then that she’d be working for Safe Futures as a data programs specialist less than four years later.

Boaz is just one of five inaugural fellows who’ve been employed through Serve Here CT, a project whose goal, in short, is to offer young, smart residents an incentive to stay in Connecticut.

Funded through a combination of state monies and private donations, Serve Here CT matches qualifying 18- to 29-year-old residents with employment opportunities in local nonprofit agencies that serve children, the elderly and arts groups.

“The state is in serious trouble financially, and also in terms of its vitality,” said Serve Here CT Founder and President Alva Greenberg, an Old Saybrook resident. “If we continue to lose young people at the rate we’re losing them, there’s little hope we’re going to regain financial balance.”

It works like this: For each participating fellow, Serve Here CT shells out $20,000 — $10,000 for their employer to put toward funding their position, and $10,000 for the fellows to apply to academic debt or use for future study.

To ensure fellows get the most out of the program, they must also attend a multi-faceted course.

In the first half of the fellowship, learning module facilitator Barret Katuna explained, the fellows met once weekly at Three Rivers Community College, learning networking techniques and getting career advice from various texts and guest speakers while bonding over the highlights and challenges of their new jobs.

For the latter half, which began in January, the meetings became bi-weekly and the fellows started working to identify and develop ways to solve a challenge within their organizations.

Katuna, who has watched the fellows grow more confident, take advantage of networking and other events and begin to meet outside the scheduled courses, said the fellows are “blossoming.”

“I think this program is really doing what it’s intended to do,” said Katuna, who’s also a professor of sociology at the University of Connecticut. “It’s exciting to be a part of it.”

Cathy Zeiner, executive director of Safe Futures, called the initiative “a win on three levels.”

For one, she said, the $10,000 stipend is no small thing for a nonprofit whose revenue largely is restricted for use on programming rather than administration.

There’s a benefit attached to bringing millennials on board, too, she said.

“Millennials have an energy and a creativity and a desire to change the world that is hugely important in energizing and really driving the engine of change,” Zeiner said. “Certainly, that’s what we’re about.”

Finally, she said, Serve Here CT’s focus on building social capital among the fellows is “exciting.”

“Being able to help millennials develop their ability to collaborate ... is really going to continue to move all of us and our missions forward,” Zeiner said, explaining how crucial cross-agency teamwork is, especially in the nonprofit sector.

With the first year of Serve Here CT drawing to a close at the end of May — the fellows will continue in their roles but the courses will cease — Greenberg is looking to next fiscal year’s program.

This time, she said, Serve Here CT is hoping to select 15 millennials with varying backgrounds and interests — there’s no “ideal” candidate — from the applications, which are open.

In five years or so, Greenberg said, she wants to see Serve Here CT span the whole state. From there, she wants to see it take hold in other states suffering from the loss of millennials.

“The better Connecticut is, the better my life is,” Greenberg said, explaining a core ideology behind Serve Here CT. “The more I can do to help other people, the better for them, and the better for me.”

For Boaz, the job she’s been doing since September, which includes creating and updating donation and volunteer databases as well as doing educational and outreach events, has been life changing.

When she learned of Serve Here CT last summer, Boaz was juggling four part-time jobs, part-time schooling and raising her son.

“It’s challenging now to get a job,” she said. “Without Serve Here initiating this and building that bridge to getting that job, I probably would’ve spent five or six more years working really, really hard at a lot of jobs just trying to make ends meet.”

Now, with a steady 9-to-5 job and the benefits that come along with it, Boaz has been able to put more energy into her part-time schooling — she has a degree in pastry making and baking, she explained, but she’s realized something more along the lines of social work is her calling.

“I still am healing every day,” Boaz said. “Working at Safe Futures really helps give me that purpose and that sense of I’m doing something good now. I’m here for a purpose.”

l.boyle@theday.com