Youth Development

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Youth Development in the Context of
Family-Centered Community Building Richard M.
Lerner Tufts University
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Human Evolution
The Emergence of Pair Bonding and
the Invention of Families
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Human Evolution

• Families,
• Child Rearing,
• and the
• Invention of Communities

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(No Transcript)
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Contemporary Issues Affecting Family-Centered Comm
unity Building in Support of Healthy and
Positive Youth Development
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Historically Unprecedented Challenges to
the Healthy Development of the Worlds Youth
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• Over the next decade, one billion (1,000,000,000)
  new children will be born
• Most of these newborns will be children of color
• Most of these newborns will be born in developing
  nations

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No One Living Today Knows How We Will

• Feed these newborns across their childhood and
  adolescence
• Handle the waste created by these youth
• Generate the energy needed to fuel the lives of
  these youth
• Create jobs for these youth, especially
  productive and fulfilling jobs that afford a
  living wage

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No One Living Today Knows How We Will (Continued)

• Deal with social justice and with the widening
  gap between rich and poor, north and south, and
  developed and non-developed
• Treat tens of millions of youth across Africa who
  will live their lives as AIDS orphans
• Diminish the marginalization, alienation, and
  demonization of youth

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The Sample Case of the United States
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America at an Historically Unprecedented Preci
pice
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Critical Issues and Challenges Faced by Todays
Youth

• Behavioral risks
• Poverty
• Global population pressures
• Global economic pressures

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39.5 Million Youth Between the Ages of 10 and
19 Years
Source Yax, L.K. U.S. Census Bureau, 1999.
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Major Categories of Youth Risk Behaviors

• Unsafe sex, teenage pregnancy, and teenage
  parenting
• School failure, underachievement, and dropout
• Delinquency, crime, and violence
• Drug and alcohol use and abuse

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Adapted from Dryfoos, 1990
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Poverty

• Beginning with the 1980s about 20 of Americas
  children and youth have been poor.
• Child poverty occurs in all geographic regions of
  America. The rates of child poverty in rural
  areas of the United States are as high as those
  in the inner cities.

Houston (1992) Jensen (1988) Simmons, Finlay,
and Yang (1991)
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Poverty Continued

• Poverty among female-headed families with
  children is 7 to 8 times higher than among
  married-couple families with children.
• Across America, 44 of African American children
  are poor. The corresponding rates of Latino and
  White, non-Hispanic American children are 38 and
  11, respectively.

Houston (1992) Jensen (1988) Simmons, Finlay,
and Yang (1991)
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Addressing the Challenges Facing Contemporary
American Youth
Prevention Versus Promotion
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Prevention is Not Promotion
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Problem Free Is Not Prepared
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Prepared is Not Engaged
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Attributes of Positive Youth Development

• Competence
• Confidence
• Connection
• Character
• Caring/Compassion

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How Can Positive Youth Development Be Promoted?

• Types of youth programs
• Characteristics of effective youth programs

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development

• Are predicated on a vision of positive youth
  development (for example, the Five Cs of
  positive youth development) and have clear aims
  (goals) for the program.
• Focus on the assets of youth and on the
  importance of their participation in every facet
  of the program including its design, conduct,
  and evaluation.

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development (Continued)

• Pay attention to the diversity of youth and of
  their family, community and cultural contexts.
  Both the special strengths and the particular
  needs of youth and of their contexts need to be
  of central concern.

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development (Continued)

• Assure that the program represents a safe space
  for youth and that it is accessible to them.
  Such a setting should also provide for youth a
  context within which they can use their time
  constructively.

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development (Continued)

• In recognition of the interrelated challenges
  facing youth, integrate the assets for positive
  youth development that exist within the
  community. Such integration involves
  collaborations (partnerships) among all
  youth-serving organizations and contributions by
  families, peers, and schools

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development (Continued)

• Provide, through the presence of safety,
  accessibility, and collaboration, broad,
  sustained, and integrated services to youth and a
  seamlesssocial support system across the
  community.

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development (Continued)

• In recognition of the importance of caring
  adult-youth relations in healthy adolescent
  development, provide training to adult leaders.
  For instance, useful training may involve
  enhancing sensitivity to diversity and providing
  information about the principles of positive
  youth development.

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development (Continued)

• Emphasize the development of life skills,
  competency, caring, civic responsibility, and
  community service or in other words the Five
  Cs of positive youth development.
• Are committed to program evaluation and to
  strengthening the use of research in the design,
  delivery, and evaluation of the program. The
  role of university-community partnerships is
  important here.

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Programs That Are Effective In Promoting Positive
Youth Development (Continued)
Advocate for youth. While programs do not (and
arguably should not) be partisan, they should
provide a clear voice to policy makers across the
political spectrum about the importance of
investing in positive youth development.
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Source Benson, 1997 Carnegie Corporation of
New York, 1995 Damon, 1997 Dryfoos, 1990, 1998
Hamilton, 1999 Lerner, 1993, 1995 Lerner and
Galambos, 1998 Little, 1993 Pittman, 1996
Roth, et. al., 1997 Schorr, 1988, 1997
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Effective Youth Programs Inculcate in Youth the
Personal (Internal) Resources, and Provide Them
with the Community (External)
Supports, Requisite for Positive Development
These are the developmental assets for positive
youth development
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Search Institutes Categories of Developmental
Assets

• External
• Support
• Empowerment
• Boundaries and expectations
• Constructive use of time
• Internal
• Commitment to learning
• Positive values
• Social competencies
• Positive identity

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Level of Violence Risk Pattern
Adapted from Leffert et al., 1998
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Level of Depression/Suicide Risk Pattern
Adapted from Leffert et al., 1998
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Level of Alcohol Risk Pattern
Adapted from Leffert et al., 1998
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Indices of Developmental Thriving

• School grades
• Leadership
• Helping others
• Maintenance of physical health
• Delay of gratification
• Valuing diversity
• Overcoming adversity

Source Scales, Benson, Leffert, and Blyth,
Applied Developmental Science, 2000.
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Developmental Thriving and the Attributes of
Positive Youth Development

• School success (competence)
• Leadership (competence, connection)
• Valuing diversity (character, caring/compassion)
• Physical health (competence, character)

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Developmental Thriving and the Attributes of
Positive Youth Development (Continued)

• Helping others (connection, character,
  caring/compassion)
• Delay of gratification (character, confidence)
• Overcoming adversity (competence, character,
  confidence)

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Leadership
0-10 Assets
11-20 Assets
21-30 Assets
31-40 Assets
Adapted from Scales et al., 2000
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Affirmation of Diversity
0-10 Assets
11-20 Assets
21-30 Assets
31-40 Assets
Adapted from Scales et al., 2000
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Helping Others
0-10 Assets
11-20 Assets
21-30 Assets
31-40 Assets
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Time spent in youth programs was the
developmental asset that appeared to have the
most pervasive positive influencepredictingthriv
ing outcomesGood youth programs provide young
people with access to caring adults and
responsible peers, as well as skill-building
activities than can reinforce the values and
skills that are associated with doing well in
school and maintaining good physical health.
Scales, Benson, Leffert, and Blyth, Applied
developmental science, 2000
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Policies aimed at giving families the capacity to
provide for children
Children deserve resources that give them

• Healthy start
• Safe environment
• Education for marketable skills
• Opportunity to give back to the community
• Freedom from prejudice and discrimination

• Boundaries and expectations
• Physiological and safety needs
• Climate of love and caring
• Inculcation of self-esteem
• Encouragement and support of growth
• Constructive use of time
• Positive values
• Positive links to the community

Programs
Outcomes for children

• Caring/Compassion
• Competence
• Character
• Connection
• Confidence

Civil Society
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Now we are positioned for an extraordinary
initiative a grand idea to move to the next
level of service to society. Enhancing the
quality of life for children, youth, and families
in the context of their communities is a
long-term program that will make a real
difference on the major problems of our time. We
have the capabilities, the leadership, and the
commitment to take such a step and make this
grand idea work. Such a project will enable us
to integrate and deploy our resources in ways
that markedly improve conditions for people who
need help. In the process, we will shape the new
model of the Americanuniversity to serve its
larger community in ways not yet seen.
Graham B. Spanier, 1997
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If youre not part of the solution then youre
part of the problem.
Eldridge Cleaver, 1967