Youth Activism and Social Justice: Transitioning Critical Learnings Into Adulthood

• In Event: 33.078 - Roundtable Session 11
  In Roundtable Session: 33.078-3 - Fostering Activism: Young People Constructing Agency in School and Beyond

Abstract

Youth activism has been found to have important youth development outcomes for youth and the potential to impact social change. Yet little is known about what previous youth activists learned about social justice from organizing and if they maintained their activism into adulthood. This ethnographic study explored what immigrant youth learned as activists in their schools and communities and how they transitioned their knowledge and skills into adulthood. Data collection included ten interviews with young adults who where previously involved in a youth activist organization. Findings suggest that despite varying levels of activism into adulthood, these previous youth activists maintained critical youth development outcomes into adulthood, particularly related to their understanding of social and political inequities affecting marginalized communities.

Author

• Roseanne Macias, California State University - Dominguez Hills