Locating Place in Learner Assets: An Analysis of a Regional Youth Initiative

• In Event: 81.033 - MTCC Roundtable Session 38
  In Roundtable Session: 81.033-2 - Negotiating Everyday Spaces: Teen Leadership, Youth Workers, and Learner Assets

Abstract

Through case study methodology, this paper explores how community educators in seven adult-youth coalitions conceptualize and enact youth assets. I argue that conflation of the various notions of assets in the applied social science fields reflects a contested term that is under theorized. I examine these discussions in the existing scholarly literature and identify two significant gaps. Currently, there is an absence of studies and theoretical works that capture what the term assets means in practice. In addition, conversations on assets overemphasize characteristics of learners and ignore the significance of place in how assets are operationalized in social context. Framing this study are three concepts rooted in theories of sociocultural learning: schema theory, mental models, and organizational learning.

Author

• James Fabionar, University of San Diego