 |
Adam Fletcher
Links for 2009-05-24 [del.icio.us]
|
- MLK Day of Service Toolkit
- Professional Landcare Network (PLANET) Day of Service Toolkit
In this guide you will find suggested tips on what is involved in organizing your event: from how to get started and project ideas, to how to promote your event and much more.
- Semester of Service Toolkit
Everything Oregonians Need to Know to Successfully Plan and Implement a Semester of Service from Volunteer Oregon
- Kids Care Clubs Summer of Service
HandsON Network has joined the Summer of Service National Affiliate Network, a national campaign sponsored by the Corporation for National and Community Service to engage more youth in service projects during the summer months.
- LSA Newsletter (April 2007)
An early mention of the "Summer of Service" concept from LSA. "Summer of Service is a nationwide initiative to engage youth, particularly those from disadvantaged circumstances, in high-quality, service-related activity during the summer months. The Summer of Service initiative recognizes the potential of all youth to contribute in meaningful ways to the communities in which they live through volunteer service. Please download the Summer of Service Toolkit that is available on the Corporation website at www.cns.gov; it includes links to examples of “high quality service and service-learning projects” developed by participating organizations, as well as tips, best practices, and a variety of other useful materials. The 2007 toolkit is targeted toward summer camp program coordinators and staff and is intended for use with small groups of youth. For more information on the Summer of Service Initiative contact Theresa Clower at tclower@cns.gov."
- National Affiliate Network for Engaging Youth in Service
"The LEAGUE has joined the Summer of Service National Affiliate Network, a national campaign sponsored by the Corporation for National and Community Service to engage more youth in service projects during the summer months. The LEAGUE, along with dozens of other youth-serving organizations that are committed to improving communities, have agreed to promote the campaign throughout our networks from June 15 to August 31."
- Innovations In Civic Participation Summer of Service page
"Summer of Service is a proposed new "rite of passage" that would forge bonds among young Americans and provide experiential learning opportunities through the common experience of service during the summer months. The Summer of Service project will create strong service programs that engage middle-school aged youth during the summers. ICP's work on this project has included assistance with drafting the legislation, building support among stakeholders, and extensive research on existing programs."
- CNCS Summer of Service webpage
Summer of Service is a national coalition of major youth-serving organizations that are committed to engaging youth in service during the summer months and recognize the potential of youth to identify issues, develop projects, and provide lasting benefits to the communities in which they live through volunteer service.
- Summer of Service Act of 2009
OpenCongress - U.S. Congress - S.466 - "A bill to amend the National and Community Service Act of 1990 to establish a Summer of Service State grant program, a Summer of Service national direct grant program, and related national activities, and for other purposes."
- United Way of Utah County Summer Of Service webpage
Includes a long list of activities through 2009
- CNCS 2008 Summer of Service Factsheet
From the Corporation
- Maine Youth Voices
"speaking out against underage drinking" is their tagline.
- Mississippi History Now | When Youth Protest: The Mississippi Civil ...
“When nobody else is moving and the students are moving, they are the leadership for everybody.” Ed King, Mississippi Civil Rights worker 1963.
|
|
|
|
|
Political Power is NOT Youth Power
|
I am growing increasingly sensitized to the myriad ways youth involvement can potentially fail young people. One of those ways is the assumption that it is only through youth involvement - formalized, systemic participation of young people throughout institutions and organizations - can young people make a difference in the decisions that affect them. However, through workshops and conversations with 1000s of adults I have come to understand that youth involvement in organizations is not the core problem. Instead, its the belief that many youth and adults hold which says that political power is the only power young people have. I would suggest the opposite.
Political power is not youth power - its just one tool among many. The two terms are not synonomous, and for all of the saber-rattling among youth rights activists and civic engagement advocates, the simple fact of the matter is that youth power is much, much bigger than these approaches consider. When I speak here I'm not only talking about political parties or the political process; instead, I'm talking about the definition of politic, which is the process by which people make decisions, and here I'm talking specifically about organizational or governmental decision-making.
Instead of concentrating solely on this form of involvement, I am beginning to understand that we need to engage with young people on their terms where they are. Dragging youth to board meetings or propping them behind podiums or insisting they join advisory committees is only going to work a very, very small portion of the time with a very limited group of youth. There are some who argue that's the very purpose of these activities, to weed out those youth who would become "leaders" throughout our society. However, and unfortunately, there are many, many very well-meaning adults who believe its these approaches that are going to engage the "every youth", and even the historically disengaged young person. In reality though, the culture, the activities and the outcomes of these activities is generally too obtuse and too minute to appeal to these youth.
Unfortunately its this type of participation that gets the brunt of attention. But we must get away from assuming this is enough. Instead, let's help every young person learn the skills and knowledge they need to make successful decisions in their own lives. Let's engage youth in identifying their locus of control and how they can affect that. Let's broaden the abilities of adults to actually meet genuine, practical and everyday needs of youth instead of creating kludges, that while well-meaning, generally result in inadequate or unsustainable outcomes.
My colleague Dan DeLucey has a great quote in the footer of his emails. He writes, "Teach me to successfully navigate life... not systems." Let's starting thinking about generalized youth involvement in decision-making this way, and then build upon that in successive opportunities, rather than vice versa. Let's remember that political power is not youth power - its just one tool among many.
|
|
|
|
|
Killing The Future of Youth
|
"Confining life to an eternal present is an insidious form of soul murder." - Cornel West
Let's not kill the future of youth.
We're at a transformative moment in history where Robert Kennedy's 1966 incantation has never been more true: "This world demands the qualities of youth: not a time of life but a state of mind, a temper of the will, a quality of imagination, a predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease." This was a spectacular statement for the Senator to make, and not the least among his radically idealistic perspectives. It also opens an appropriate doorway towards any discussion about the future of youth, as any conversation about tomorrow is always ushered in by yesterday.
Yesterday... the 1960s were a powerful gateway experience for today's leadership to see, experience and understand the power of young people, and while their frustrated notions of democratic engagement ultimately and unfortunately led to the hyper-neoliberalism, it also laid stepping stones towards today's youth movement, as these days are building towards tomorrow's radically different perspectives. Right now young people are actively engaged in a radical re-envisioning of the role of youth throughout society, and I thoroughly believe our society is at a "push-through" moment that is going to lead to a spectacular future. Let's examine that a little.
"The secret message communicated to most young people today by the society around them is that they are not needed, that the society will run itself quite nicely until they - at some distant point in the future - will take over the reigns..." Taken with all that in mind, the whole body of youth involvement activities seems to portray a youth movement in transition. Rather than relying on the grandious posturing of well-meaning intellectuals, idealistic protest events, or even elitist summits of the early 20th century, young people today are actually engaged in the proactive and effective development of a society in the making. Rather than being observers in a museum, youth today are co-scientists in the laboratory of society; I would suggest that with all of these activities underway we're doing nothing less than Alfie Kohn insisted when he wrote, "Children, after all, are not just adults-in-the-making. They are people whose current needs and rights and experiences must be taken seriously." These activities take young people seriously. But we're not done yet.
The future of youth is one of hope and will be played out in successive generations of possiblity and power. However, and fortunately, the history of the future isn't mine to write today. Let youth predict their own future. My conscience talks to me often, and this blog is sometimes the exercise of me letting me out. This morning it started to scream louder at me as I considered what I was going to write. So I'll stop here, and let my reading of the past and your own imagination take us to the future.
Reading Dr. West's Democracy Matters reminds me that I want to express the future that I see in store, a future that is so vibrant and dynamic that I can't help but put it down. I have tried before, and I will again today. Remember that when he wrote, "Confining life to an eternal present is an insidious form of soul murder," West was talking to us: We have to make the experience, function and outcomes of "youth" different than we are right now - and when they're different they must be reinvented again. Anything less than that is killing the future of youth.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Look Back to Move Forward
|
I believe in the power of reflection and intentionally taking time to look inside and examine and explore and imagine and re-examine and re-imagine the life I live, the times I've had and the places I've been. Lately I've been in a space where that exploration has led me into my far past, back to times when I was a youth. I have spent the last few days in Omaha, Nebraska, the city where I spent my teen years, where I graduated from high school, where I had my first jobs and decided my life's occupation, and where I formed friendships that helped me imagine the rest of my life.
This has been an exceptional time for a variety of reasons. It is the first time I've visited the city on my own terms as an adult. I've had the chance to travel through here twice in the last 14 years since I moved away, and both of those were wholly unfulfilling; this time is completely different, as I'm able to imbibe in the indulgence of tourism: I have been to the museums, spent a great deal of time in the libraries as part of an intellectual exercise, and haunt many of the places I enjoyed as a youth. Continuing to nurture my minor obsession with the neighborhood I grew up in, I have scoured North Omaha for all the landmarks I've learned about and taken a lot of pictures. I have also had the privilege of reconnecting with many old friends. Its that place that stops me up for a minute.
I've lived away from the neighborhood I grew up in for all of my adult life, far away. As a young person I formed my identity along the lines of the friends I surrounded myself with, but they weren't the only formative force. I also spent my teen years surrounded by a crew of peers who lived in my neighborhood, hung around with my older brother, and every now and then dragged me along with them. This wasn't so much a conscious choice I made; instead it was a kind of obligation I felt to be a little brother. And it was cool. These people - some two years older than me, some my age - were braver, bolder, tougher and funnier than me, all the time. My early understanding of how to relate to women, how to treat friends, what to do with family, how to identify with my school and neighborhood... all these were forged within the relationships I had with these friends. Surely these understandings have changed over time, as I've grown and matured, but I would be lieing if I said they didn't still inform me to some extent.
So last night we had a reunion of sorts. Gathered into one crowded room were 25 or 30 folks who'd rescinded to the recesses of my imagination, a place where memories don't live like people do. Suddenly so many of these characters were front and center in my attention, alive and reclaiming their own youth, as well. Much like a coal miner I strove to find value in the life I've lived by digging their stories. Many of them have 17 or 18-year-old kids; a few have been in and out of prison; a bunch work in garages and plants. The rough and stressful realities we may face everyday melted off a bunch of us; others seemed like they couldn't shake them. But as time went on it seemed like everyone laughed a little; our host worked the crowd to draw everyone in, if only for a few minutes; and I had some great conversations. I spent a long time talking with a mama/educator friend who helped me bridge the crazy distance I was feeling at moments.
What I recalled in my reflection in talking with these friends is that this is what all this work is for me: My constant attempt to reconcile the life I lived as a youth and the spectacular privilege I've experienced as an adult. All the powerful experiences, the meaningful learning and the intentionality I've developed would be for naught were I not paying tribute and honoring the past I've lived. Looking back on those times allows me to find the diamond in that coal mine; but it also let's me find value in the coal itself. No matter where you lived, how you came up, I believe we should all do this type of exploration and reflection as frequently as we can. Look back to move forward.
|
|
Links for 2009-05-14 [del.icio.us]
|
- Empowering Youth Through National Policies
One of the principal aims of UNESCO’s long-standing commitment to youth is the
empowerment of young people in order to foster their full and equal participation in all spheres
of society.The ultimate objective of this publication, in fact, is to provide a conceptual,m e t h o d o l o g i c a l
and practical guideline that will facilitate the achievement of this aim.
|
|
|
|
|
Links for 2009-05-13 [del.icio.us]
|
- Is AMCHP Ready to Embrace Youth Leadership?
The Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs article on next steps with youth involvement
- Youth Voice: A Guide for Engaging Youth in Leadership and Decision-Making in Service Learning Programs
A Learn & Serve America imprint by a variety of folks, including Cindy Sherer.
- Getting Started
The purpose of "Getting Started" is to offer guidelines and sample documents for organizations interested in establishing a youth advisory committee. Youthgrantmakers.org is a communication of the Michigan Community Foundation Youth Project (MCFYP) of the Council of Michigan Foundations, with funding from the W. K. Kellogg Foundation.
Chapters include: Learn the basic components of starting a YAC; How to recruit youth grantmakers and structure a YAC; Learn how to have a successful orientation and training for your YAC members; Find out how to determine the needs of youth in your community; Learn how the grantmaking process should run from start to finish; How to raise money for your endowment fund; Make community service a vital component of the YAC; How to promote your YAC's accomplishments and recognize your members; Learn why evaluation is so important to the success of your YAC.
- Best Practices in Youth Philanthropy
by Pam Garza and Pam Stevens for the Coalition of Community Foundations for Youth.
- Leadership Lincoln Youth Programs (Nebraska)
Leadership Lincoln offers a variety of extracurricular programs to instill our community's youth with the value of strong leadership and to demonstrate the various roles they can play in making a difference. Includes Youth Leadership Lincoln, Youth Leadership Academy, Youth In Action Center and YouthInspire Foundation.
- South Sioux City Youth Leadership Council (Iowa)
The mission of the Youth Leadership Council is to involve youth in the process to discuss community issues, including safety, serve others through community service and enhancement, and serve as a liaison to the South Sioux City Council.
- Global Effort for Sustainable Development
From the International Olympic Committee website, a report about the 8th World Conference on Sport and the Environment that youth involvement is important to them.
- TAP Project: A Guide for Youth Involvement
“Water – Imagine a life without it” is a guide for youth brought to you by the U.S. Fund for UNICEF’s Tap Project in conjunction with the TeachUNICEF program, which aims to give young people vital information about the global water crisis and to suggest ways that they can get involved. The guide provides background information about water use in the U.S., gives young people a glimpse into the lives of children in countries without easy access to clean water, describes ways that UNICEF is responding to this global crisis, and helps young people think
of ways they can raise awareness among their peers, families, and communities.
- Across the Country, Youth Programs Bring the Issue of Brownfields Home
The story of youth involvement in a BPA program
- Citizenship Education Longitudinal Study (CELS): Sixth Annual Report
Young People’s Civic Participation In and Beyond School: Attitudes, Intentions and Influences. Published by the Department for Children, Schools and Families in the UK.
- thesouce
Through the Suffolk Youth and Connexions Service young people aged 13-19 (up to 25 for those with additional needs), can access information, advice, help and support on a one-to-one basis or as part of a group. They can also take part in a range of outdoor activities, youth clubs and youth projects in their local community.
- School Councils UK Standard - Wiki
This site allows anyone with an interest to contribute to and keep up to date with the development of the School Councils UK Standard. We'll be doing all of our development work on the Standard on this site from now on, so what you see here is what the Standard will be when it's launched.
- Get Youth on Board! A Toolkit for Stakeholder Collaboration and Youth Promotion
"Implementation on Children's and Youth Rights." Federal Commission on Economic Development and Cooperation.
|
|
|
|
|
Entry Points
|
The story might go like this: there was a once a young person, a youth, who belonged to a church, went to school, and played a neighborhood sport. Once a month this youth went to the town hall for youth council, and they participated in a youth leadership development program sponsored by the local Urban League. This youth wasn't particularly successful in school, despite trying - but teachers lent a hand, and their foster parents were supportive. Friends laid on both sides of the engagement spectrum, and there were distractions and obstacles to academic and social acheivement everyday. One day this youth learns about youth voice, and after researching on the Internet on their own they learn about youth rights and civic engagement, too. Where should this youth begin in their advocacy? What should they do or say and to whom should they do or say those things? I have found more than one scenario in the work I've done, and will share the responses I've seen later. First I want to know what you think. -- This is Adam Fletcher's blog originally posted at http://www.YoungerWorld.org. For more see http://www.bicyclingfish.com
|
|
|
|
|
The Conundrums of Working in Systems.
|
I a systems worker who currently operates and has operated in a variety of systems for a number of years. Today its mainly the state health department here in Washington, in addition to growing work in the mental arena and community development. Historically, these systems have included education, national service and youth development. Recently I have become acutely aware of the conundrum presented by youth involvement. There are ethical, social, educational and cultural challenges that each must be called out for what they are. I am faced with an ethical imperative to do this work that I have spent my lifetime doing, not simply because of my own history, but rather because I know from personal and professional experience the effectiveness and potential inherent in youth involvement. On its surface, youth involvement does not appear to be at odds with any of the design of the state's government, this particular agency, or public health as a whole. However, scratch underneath the surface as I have done and you'll discover underlying tensions reflecting adultism, along with racial, class, socio-economic and cultural barriers. The presumption that youth involvement is enough simply isn't enough in many of these settings; rather, in order to conduct any sustainable, deep work designed to accomplish the lofty task of personalizing public health (or whichever system you operate in) youth involvement advocates must come to understand their work as a logical extension of their duties.
The acknowledgment of the social implications of youth involvement doesn't come lightly to me. I readily acknowledge that at times I can be a "joiner". So working in a gigantic state agency attempting to build a social network which can support me as a person within the system can be challenging, particularly when your logical allies are other youth-oriented program workers. The reality of being a youth involvement advocate in relationship to those allies has been challenging, particularly when working in lateral relationships which I value. There's a particular conscientiousness that I haven't always been attuned to.
Educational backgrounds often factor into one's understanding of youth involvement, as they do with most forms of involvement, whether parent, family, client or constituent. Working hard and reflecting often can lead to intense learning that grows on its own; however, it can also set in stone negative patterns that promote adultism and undermine youth involvement. If a person lacks a higher education, they may be devoid the language to vocalize what they inherently grasp; additionally, the may lack the skills or knowledge necessary to develop the steps needed to successfully involve young people. However, the presence of a college degree does not equate to knowledge, or concurance; rather, a person's educational field likely affects how they go about their work. A state worker with a CHES certification will have a different perspective than someone who has a degree in experiential education; similar to the differences between curriculum design majors and educational policy majors. Each of those folks will see youth involvement differently according to their discipline, and similar to the first person who'd reflected on their experiences, all have their own understandings of what, how, who, when, where and why youth involvement matters. Note: As an autodidact I am sensative to the implication that those who've spent a lot of time in school know more than those who haven't. The power of self-education can't be underestimated.
Finally, there are a lot of cultural considerations with youth involvement. Two of the most poignant documents I've read addressing the different cultural perspectives towards young people and youth involvement come from different areas of the United Nations: first is UNICEF Innocenti Centre's The Evolving Capacities of the Child [pdf] by Gerison Lansdown, and the second is Eliminating Corporal Punishment, which is an imprint of UNESCO. Both pay particularly poignant attention to how culture factors into a young person's involvement in both systems and throughout their personal lives. In my systems work I have come to discover there are some very real cultural undertones within the agencies I've operated. In schools I have found there is a broad acceptance for normative assumptions about the necessary power of adults over students. In public health I have discovered a propensity towards social justice and the necessary requirement of the government to be reponsive to the disparities throughout society.
All of that is to say that we must be deliberate and practical about youth involvement no matter where we're working, but particularly when we're working inside to change the inside. At some point in the near future I will explore how these conundrums play out inside systems; in the meantime I would love to hear about your experience, no matter what the size of your organization or community.
|
|
|
Latest Posts
Monthly Archive
Change Language
Tags Archive
action activities adam adultallies adultism commonaction democraticschools educação engagement ephebiphobia freechild identity mudança pedophobia projects reflection research schoolimprovement schools soundout studentvoice theory voice youth youthempowerment youthpolicy youthrights youthvoice youthwork
100545 views
|
|
