Promoting Developmental Assets in Positive Youth Development: Identity Development Process through Youth Leadership Mentoring in Malaysia

Mohd Mursyid Arshad,Nur Raihan Che Nawi,Ismi Arif Ismail,Nasreen Khanum Nawab Khan

doi:10.6007/ijarbss/v9-i11/6712

Mohd Mursyid Arshad, Nur Raihan Che Nawi + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.6007/ijarbss/v9-i11/6712

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Abstract

Involvement in leadership activities is one of the approaches that enhances Positive Youth Development (PYD) among youths. The focus on mentoring process in a leadership program serves as the basis for developing these positive youth elements and has the potential to increase youth's readiness to lead Youth leadership development is a primary focus in Malaysia’s development agenda as outlined in the Malaysia Youth Policy (2015) and Youth Societies and Youth Development Act 668 (2019). Research and practice concur that the involvement of young leaders can be strengthened through wider exposure and professional training through mentoring. Mentoring offers a unique learning process that has been shown to enhance youth development outcomes and strengthening competence of youth leaders. The study was conducted to explore the identity development process in promoting developmental assets through the youth leadership mentoring. The study was conducted using a qualitative approach informed by the case study paradigm that involved 13 informants through in-depth interview data collection, participant observation and document analysis. Empirical findings from the study show that identity development resulted from the mentoring process through the value of tolerance, promotes empathy and shaping philanthropy spirit among youth leaders. In conclusion, data indicated that mentoring clearly has the potential to constitute the process of identity building among youth, and this process contributes to the development of their leadership capacities.

Highlights

The Positive Youth Development (PYD) approach, which provides the theoretical basis for developing youth potential (Lerner et al, 2015), essentially requires empirical investigations to understand character development of youth leaders by mentoring
In line with Malaysia’s vision of becoming a developed nation, the Malaysian Youth Policy 2015 aims to strengthen the leadership development process among youth so that the nation will rank among the top countries in the world in terms of economic development, citizen wellbeing and innovation
This research was conducted to explore how youth who participated in leadership programs that incorporate mentoring, are nurtured to inculcate positive traits promoted by PYD

Summary

Introduction

The Positive Youth Development (PYD) approach, which provides the theoretical basis for developing youth potential (Lerner et al, 2015), essentially requires empirical investigations to understand character development of youth leaders by mentoring. In Malaysia, youth leadership development is a primary focus in Malaysia’s development agenda as outlined in the Malaysian Youth Policy 2015 initiative. In line with Malaysia’s vision of becoming a developed nation, the Malaysian Youth Policy 2015 aims to strengthen the leadership development process among youth so that the nation will rank among the top countries in the world in terms of economic development, citizen wellbeing and innovation. Researchers and practitioners concur that the involvement of young leaders in nationbuilding can be strengthened through wider exposure and professional training, as well as through mentoring. As a learning process, mentoring has been shown to enhance youth development outcomes such as raising the competence of youth leaders. Notwithstanding the challenges of mentoring, policy-makers of youth development programs should highlight its benefits

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