Engaging children and adolescents in local decision-making

Abstract

For three years, children and adolescents in Boulder, Colorado, USA, had been studying, modeling and discussing their ideas for the Boulder Civic Area, a public space in the heart of downtown Boulder. Primary school children designed tree houses for the space so they could see birds, touch trees, read books and simply hang out, and their secondary school peers readily endorsed these ideas. In May 2015, the city’s planning board unanimously passed an amendment to incorporate the “ideas from Growing Up Boulder, including . . . a tree house for children” into the Boulder Civic Area Master Plan . This out - come was a result of activities facilitated through Growing Up Boulder, an ongoing child and youth friendly city initiative that has enabled community leaders to embrace young people’s design and planning ideas and codified them into city policy (Derr et al. 2013). This chapter will discuss the establishment, organizational structure, funding sources and engagement techniques for a child and youth engagement program called Growing Up Boulder (GUB), focusing on the strong partnerships at its core. This discussion will present GUB as a practical model from which other communities can learn in order to support and engage children and adolescents in community decision- making. As a long-running initiative, GUB continues to evolve and reflect on successes and challenges, seeking to incorporate best practices from research and practice. The chapter concludes with a reflection on GUB’s impact and offers recommendations for other communities looking to establish their own child friendly city initiative.