Youth Participatory Action Research on Hustling and Its Consequences: A Report from the Field

Abstract

Children, Youth and Environments 14(2), 2004 Youth Participatory Action Research on Hustling and Its Consequences: A Report from the Field Damion Morgan Victor Pacheco Chiedza Rodriguez Elsie Vazquez Marlene Berg Jean Schensul Institute for Community Research Hartford, Connecticut Citation: Morgan, Damion, Victor Pacheco, Chiedza Rodriguea, Elsie Vazquez, Marlene Berg and Jean Schensul. (2004). “Youth Participatory Action Research on Hustling and Its Consequences: A Report from the Field.” Children, Youth and Environments 14(2): 201-228. Comment on this Field Report© 2004 Children, Youth and Environments Youth Participatory Action Research on Hustling and Its Consequences… 202 Introduction This report from the field documents the process and results of a specific Summer Youth Research Institute (SYRI) for urban youth. The SYRI is a seven-week program that is designed to empower youth individually and in groups to think critically about their environment, conduct research on an issue affecting them and their peers that they would like to change, and use the research to make a difference. We call this approach Youth Participatory Action Research or YouthPAR . The SYRI is a central component of the Institute for Community Research’s work with urban youth. It is designed to enable youth to reflect on their complex gender, ethnic/racial, sexual and socio-cultural identities; to forge alliances through close working relationships; to learn intellectual, social and emotional skills through ethnographic research; and to transform the learning and self-reflection process and their research findings into meaningful social change efforts. The Institute for Community Research (ICR) is a non-profit community research organization established in 1987 to work with communities using the tools of research (theory, method, dissemination, intervention) as a method for promoting justice and equity in a multiethnic society. One of the main ways that ICR translates its mission into action is by partnering with community residents and youth to use interactive qualitative and quantitative research approaches to tackle significant community problems. This approach to Participatory Action Research has a long history in the social sciences. What makes the ICR model different is the sharing and simultaneous interaction of scientific research technology and community issues, concerns, and sociocultural practice. Community residents and groups, including youth, learn research methods in the context of sharing their knowledge and perspectives about the issue they select for study and change. Their knowledge and assessment of the environment enters into the research design. They collect the information with technical assistance, benefiting from face-to-face interaction with other members of their own community. They are also involved in all aspects of data analysis, interpretation and use. This model has been used for many years at ICR with urban women and men, youth, parents of young children, and neighborhood advocates. Adults and youth of all ages learn the same advocacy research approach and methods, but the language and activities are geared appropriately to the age, gender, developmental stage and cultural context of each group. It is only recently that Youth-PAR has begun to be more widely recognized as a legitimate approach in working with youth. Youth-led research was first used in environmental advocacy, under the rubric of service learning. Civic engagement by studying and advocating for environmental change fit well with science education, and measuring toxic or troubling aspects of the physical environment was relatively straightforward for youth. Youth-led research is now being incorporated into other areas of youth advocacy– for example, public health (in particular, environmentally related areas such as asthma reduction) and assessment of youth services including school policies that effect young people. Youth Participatory Action Research on Hustling and Its Consequences… 203 ICR is located in Hartford, Connecticut, a city of about 130,000 residents, most of them of color, and many of them poor. Residents and activists in Hartford say, “Hartford is a small city with big city problems.” The city has struggled to gentrify for nearly 30 years, claiming that its tax base is insufficient to support educational, economic, transportation, housing, health services, and other infrastructure. The implications of this struggle and the manner in which it has been approached has had a significant bearing on the quality of life for Hartford’s children and youth, resulting in privatizing education...