For Us, By Us: Utilizing Youth Engagement & Participatory Action Research Strategies for Youth of Color

• In Event: 3-065 - From Perception to Participation: Examining Youth Engagement to Promote Resilience among Urban Youth of Color

Integrative Statement

As a critical time period in child development, adolescence plays a substantial role in one’s future quality of life. However, adolescents are frequently not included in the development and implementation of programming focused on them. This presentation describes youths’ reports of the impact of participatory strategies used to promote program engagement and improved research accuracy in a large-scale study of cross-age mentoring with youth of color in four high-poverty, high-crime urban U.S. communities. While services to build resilience against violence engagement for youth of color residing in high-poverty, high-crime U.S. communities are vitally important, they have not been sufficiently developed or studied to respond to the existing needs. When services conceptualized for more privileged populations are applied to highly stressed urban poor youth, high rates of attrition result. Youth empowerment and participatory action strategies represent promising avenues to contribute as remedies. Involving youth as co-designers and co-evaluators of services potentially makes services more directly meaningful for them. In fact, over several years of participatory work, youth consistently emphasized the value of mentoring younger peers from their community, affirming other findings that cross age peer mentoring has been found to positively influence a host of outcomes such as identity development, social-emotional development, and reduced delinquency, among many others (Bulanda & Tyson McCrea, 2013; DuBois, Portillo, Rhodes, Silverthorne & Valentine, 2011; Karcher, 2005). Findings from a study of the impact of the cross-age peer mentoring program, Saving Lives, Inspiring Youth, are reported here, focusing on youths’ experiences of the value of participatory methods (Richards, McCrea, Dusing, DiClemente, Deane & Quimby, 2017). The cross-age mentoring study has implemented diverse participatory methodologies, including peer-to-peer interviews. Youth co-authored the program website, co-presented, and co-authored papers. 81 Black American and Latinx adolescent mentors (M age =17.59; 67% female) residing in low income, high crime neighborhoods in the South and West sides of Chicago completed qualitative peer-to-peer interviews about their time spent in the Saving Lives, Inspiring Youth mentoring program. Transcripts of the interviews were reviewed and coded thematically based on the key areas of interest from the topics discussed by youth in their peer-to-peer interviews. The qualitative analyses of the interviews revealed four broad themes related to their involvement in the project: opportunities to express appreciation or critique of programming, intrinsic qualities promoted through the program, opportunities to be agents of change in their communities, and personal benefits of being co-evaluators of the mentoring program. The findings suggest the importance of including youth engagement strategies in programs designed to promote positive youth development as youth are willing and able to utilize their own social capital. Doing so can give rise to a collaborative, co-learning relationship between interventionists, researchers, and youth of color, amplifying youths’ dignity and human capital, contributing to more accurate knowledge about their strengths, and building their capacity to serve as agents of change.

Authors

• Cynthia Onyeka, Loyola University Chicago
  Presenting Author

• Kevin Miller, Loyola University Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• Maryse Richards, Loyola University Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• Katherine Tyson McCrea, Loyola University Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• Chana Matthews, Loyola University Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author