Constructing New Possibilities: Minoritized Youth Researchers and the Mental Health Crisis in K–12 Schools

Session Type: Working Group Roundtable

Abstract

This roundtable convenes a group of educational researchers, practitioners, and minoritized youth researchers from across the country, (e.g., Illinois, Utah, and Texas) to share their youth participatory action research (YPAR) projects on the mental health crisis in our K12 public schools. Although YPAR represents a tool to center the voices, perspectives, and lived experiences of racially marginalized youth, the empirical literature on mental health in K12 schools still renders adults in these contexts (e.g., principals, teachers, school psychologists, and counselors) as the only experts on this issue. This roundtable aims to offer new possibilities on how K12 schools can address mental health and well-being through the insights of research conducted with and by minoritized youth.

Sub Unit

• SIG-Grassroots Community and Youth Organizing for Educational Justice

Chair

• Van T. Lac, University of Illinois at Chicago

Papers

• Youth Participatory Action Research and the Mental Health of Students and Teachers in a South Texas High School - Van T. Lac, University of Illinois at Chicago; Ariel Reyes, IDEA Charter School; Maranda Hernandez, University of Texas - San Antonio; Carolina Montez-Decoa, University of Texas - San Antonio

• “It's Something That Is There but Doesn't Really Get Addressed”: Latinx Youth Perspectives on Stress - Stephanie Torres, University of Illinois at Chicago; Jillian Garcia, University of Illinois at Chicago

• Forging a Sense of Belonging for Refugee Background Students in Out-of-School Spaces - Joshua Samson, University of Utah

• Sexuality Education, Identity Formation, and Mental Health - Ana Carolina Fernandes de Bessa Antunes, University of Utah

Discussant

• Ben Kirshner, University of Colorado - Boulder