Youth Council Research Articles

Sariling Gawa Youth Council as a Case Study of Youth Leadership Development in Hawai'i

SUMMARY This article describes Sariling Gawa Youth Council as a case study of youth leadership development in Hawai'i. Since 1980, thousands of young people-primarily Filipino youth-have participated in Sariling Gawa activities which have developed their leadership skills. Many of them have continued to lead the organization and utilize what they learned with numerous local organizations and state agencies. The authors examine Sariling Gawa's growth, structure, and other factors that contribute to its longevity. The model includes (1) youth empowerment through building their leadership skills, (2) fostering and strengthening peer social support and social networks, (3) promotion of positive ethnic identity, and (4) community capacity building by involving youth in civic and community affairs.

Delivering Justice: W. W. Law and the Fight for Civil Rights (review)

Reviewed by: Delivering Justice: W. W. Law and the Fight for Civil Rights Deborah Stevenson Haskins, Jim Delivering Justice: W. W. Law and the Fight for Civil Rights; illus. by Benny Andrews. Candlewick, 2005 [32p] ISBN 0-7636-2592-2$16.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 2-4 While picture-book biographies of Rosa Parks abound (see Giovanni's Rosa, BCCB 11/05), there were plenty of other people fighting for civil rights, and veteran author [End Page 183] Haskins here chronicles the life of Georgian activist Westley Wallace Law. Backed by a loving family, including a grandmother who at his birth "prayed that you would grow up to be a leader of our people," Law early observed and resented the unfairness of segregation. His commitment to the cause started with the NAACP Youth Council, and he subsequently became a local leader, spearheading Savannah's lunch-counter sit-in and subsequent boycott of segregated downtown businesses. The picture of Law is tightly and effectively focused, with his civil rights work the main point of the book as it was his life (though he wanted to be a teacher, his NAACP activities meant no one would hire him, so he spent his life as a letter carrier). Haskins makes clear that Law combined a firm belief in nonviolence with a tactical wisdom that made him a particularly effective leader, respected by the white community as well as the black. The language is simple and accessible, with each spread's compact text titled as if it were a chapter, a format that will reassure novice readers. Andrews' oil paintings have a rich solidity, and the layering of cutout figures against the background brings the human drama into, literally, sharp relief; the elongated figures are quietly statuesque, making the people as appropriately monumental as the events. Effective as a readaloud or a readalone, this is a subtle reminder that it wasn't just a few famous individuals that performed the civil rights movement's hard and heroic work. Copyright © 2005 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Somerville youth council

In fall 2004, after many years of discussion, the Somerville Youth Council started. Its mission is to create an ongoing process of discussion, critical thinking, and problem solving to develop solutions to the challenges that youth encounter. In order to be an effective voice for youth, the Somerville Youth Council will have a diverse membership, develop expectations of mutual understanding and respect, and ensure that the means of communication builds bridges between youth, decision makers, and all others in Somerville. Owadokun, one of the council founders, has since moved to Nigeria, where she is forming a youth council in her community. Avilés is an active Youth Council youth member.

Around the Sacred Fire: Native Religious Activism in the Red Power Era: A Narrative Map of the Indian Ecumenical Conference (review)

Reviewed by: Around the Sacred Fire: Native Religious Activism in the Red Power Era: A Narrative Map of the Indian Ecumenical Conference George E. Tinker (bio) Around the Sacred Fire: Native Religious Activism in the Red Power Era: A Narrative Map of the Indian Ecumenical Conference by James TreatPalgrave Macmillan, 2003 his is a volume about a little-known part of the broader Indian activist movement of the 1970s called the Indian Ecumenical Conferences. In the foment generated by the American Indian Movement, National Indian Youth Council, Indians of All Tribes, and several less-remembered "Red Power" or movement organizations, the Indian Ecumenical Conferences gave voice to one smaller but distinct slice of the American Indian nationalism of the day. With deeper roots in Canada than in the United States, this part of the movement brought together traditional Indian religious adherents along with those Christian Indians who leaned more toward affirming traditional culture and values. It is, as the subtitle announces, a narrative history rather than a critically argued analysis. The book begins by tracing Treat's account of the beginnings [End Page 203] of what he calls the "red power movement" from the early twentieth century on, but with particular attention paid to the 1960s. Treat's rendition of this critical period in the development of Indian activism is seriously deficient in its near total disregard of the beginnings of the American Indian Movement but does nicely treat some of the other currents of foment and their intertwining relationships. Curiously enough, in his brief retelling of this history he fails to note the foundational work of Ward Churchill or the excellent analysis of Robert Warrior and Paul Chaat Smith and their discussions about this historical period.1 It becomes apparent through the end of the volume that his disregard of AIM in this first chapter is much more than an oversight; it is an intentional disavowal. The second chapter introduces the renowned Cherokee anthropologist, Robert Thomas, who was an important figure in the early development of the Indian Ecumenical Conferences, and gives a thumbnail sketch of his life and work. This is in some respects the best writing of the book, yet this chapter is wholly derivative, relying as it does on critical work that has already been published by others on Thomas's life and work. The third chapter shifts the focus of the book decidedly toward Canada and Canadian Native peoples' history, focusing on the history of Christian missionary outreach, the work of Edward Ahenakew, one of the early Native Anglican priests, and the ongoing tensions within that church over their missionary enterprises. The last part of the chapter is given over to contemporary church activism, focusing rather unfortunately on one extremely well-meaning non-Native priest—who is important to Treat's project because of the priest's closeness to Robert Thomas and their joint role as organizers in the Indian Ecumenical Conferences. The shift here to almost exclusive concern for the context of Canada signals what is to come in the rest of the volume. This book is essentially about Canada and Treat's strange contention, carried by the weight of anecdotal narrative rather than by argumentation, that the resurgence of Indian traditional religious traditions was initiated and significantly advanced by the Episcopal Church in Canada. This is an inference, of course, that would be greeted with certain surprise by most Episcopalians in Canada today, who only know that Native peoples continue to exist because of the intense public scandal surrounding reve-lations of the persistent history of white Episcopalian sexual abuse of Native children in mission boarding schools and the resultant law suits that have threatened the continued existence of their church. The fourth chapter continues this exploration of the Canadian context, focusing on the Canadian counterculture movement of the late 1960s and its expression in the alternative higher education experiment at the University of Toronto, and moving toward a discussion of Canadian Indian author and activist Harold Cardinal. The experimental [End Page 204] education unit, called Rochdale College, also housed the Institute of Indian Studies. Chapter 5 initiates descriptions of the ensuing conferences with a discussion of the organizing efforts during the few...

Between Contending Forces: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the African American Freedom Struggle

In 1959 Ella Baker, the interim executive director ofthe Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), urged Martin Luther King, Jr., and other SCLC officers to emphasize local organizing and protests. Since its founding two years earlier, SCLC had accomplished few of its ambitious goals, and Baker was especially disturbed that the organization had failed to stimulate coordinated action by local groups or to develop potential capable of building vital movement of nonviolent direct mass (2). Within months of Baker's remarks, the lunch counter desegregation sit-ins in Greensboro ignited the type of movement she advocated, but black college students, rather than King and his SCLC colleagues, were spearheading the new movement. After years of working under NAACP officials as well as King, Baker wrote early in i960 of her scars of battle, the frustration and the disillusionment that come when the prophetic leader turns out to have heavy feet of clay. She found refreshing the inclination toward group-centered leader ship ofthe student protesters (3). Baker's comments suggested the difficulties King faced during the early 1960s as desegregation protests escalated in many southern communities. Although many lauded him for his courage and cha risma, King moved cautiously as he attempted to build on the success of the Montgomery bus boycott. Baker was not the only person affiliated with SCLC who believed that the group should move beyond its voter registration emphasis and begin mobilizing mass protests. Birmingham minister Fred Shuttlesworth was the most vocal of King's SCLC colleagues in pushing for more aggressive tactics against the Jim Crow system in the South. Even before becoming a SCLC founder, he had organized the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights after Alabama officials banned the NAACP from operating in the state. Despite having his home bombed and suffering a severe beating when he attempted to enroll his children in previously all-white public schools, Shuttlesworth consistently pushed King toward greater militancy. It is my conviction that it is our duty and right to move courageously against Segregation: to attack it rather than waiting to defend ourselves, he insisted in a 1957 letter to King (4). Outside SCLC's ranks there were many other signs of grassroots militancy during the late 1950s. The bravery ofthe Little Rock Nine as they confronted white mobs seeking to prevent them from desegregat ing Central High School in 1957 was one of many instances of black teenagers assuming prominent roles in the civil rights movement. The following year, members ofthe NAACP Youth Council in Okla homa City launched a series of protests against segregated lunch counters, and similar protests occurred in Wichita, Kansas. Youth Marches for Integrated Schools, held in Washington, D.C, in 1958 and 1959, attracted thousands of young participants. Although most of these youthful activists followed King's nonviolent strategy, King's public debate at the end of the 1950s with Robert F. Williams, the North Carolina NAACP leader who sparked controversy by advocating armed self defense, gave hints ofthe forceful tactical and ideological challenges King would later face from black militants such as Malcolm X and Stokely Carmichael (5). The student led sit-in campaign of early i960 was another clear indication that King's status as the preeminent symbol ofthe African American freedom struggle would remain tenuous. He publicly supported the sit-ins but also realized that had taken the struggle for justice into their own hands. During the spring of i960 he spoke at the founding conference of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), urging student leaders to recruit volunteers willing to go to jail rather than pay bail or fines (6). But the increasingly militant, self-reliant SNCC activists were more will ing to take King's advice than he was. While several thousand student protesters went to jail during i960, King limited himself to sporadic involvement in civil disobedience while defending himself against trumped-up charges of falsifying his Alabama state tax returns, for which he was ultimately acquitted. When students convinced him to join an October i960 sit-in in Atlanta, King's impulsive decision had unexpected consequences that reminded him that celebrity was at times a liability as well as an asset. Georgia officials used his arrest as an opportunity to imprison him for violating an earlier traffic offense. Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy then intervened

Having Their Say: Young People and Participation—European Experiences

Children, Youth and Environments Vol. 16 No. 2 (2006) ISSN: 1546-2250 Having Their Say: Young People and Participation— European Experiences Crimmens, David and West, Andrew (2004). Russell House Publishing; 150 pages. ISBN 1898924783. In the introduction to their edited collection Having Their Say, David Crimmens and Andrew West describe the current state of young people’s participation as a work in progress, noting that “the end is not achieved, perhaps not even in sight… (1). In this book, the editors have collected a series of useful accounts of the politicized nature of young people’s participation and how the politics gets “played out” in the real, daily lives of young people. Based on the European experience, the book provides insights into the questions that plague those who are committed to the ideals of young people’s participation but often feel over-burdened by moral conflicts of representation and authenticity. The collection starts with a thorough and thoughtful introduction that provides a clear historical and political overview of how “participation” came to enter the burgeoning child and youth studies agenda. The book then delves into a number of clear, honest accounts of the contested nature of children’s participation, the drawing of borders of relationships, and struggles over the meanings of practice and purpose. Clearly located within the framework of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the variety of country accounts and the theoretical work by the authors create a frame for these accounts that is thought-provoking and insightful. In the introduction, Crimmens and West describe the key themes of the book chapters to be the “contested nature of children’s participation, the role of adults, the struggle to find appropriate forms and to develop meaningful practice, and the problems of theory, implementation and discourse on children’s citizenship” (11). I found the second chapter by West particularly worthwhile as it gives an un-biased account of the key discussions within and 304 contributors to the advancing field of children’s participation. He also brings together some of the central issues of relationships and power, and does not hesitate to question some of the underlying assumptions around children’s participatory projects that often are taken for granted, e.g.: why would children want to engage with adults? Why is adult mimicry so often promoted as a key component of the “training” of children to be good participants? What are adults’ intentions regarding children’s participation? It seems that adults often view children’s participation as something that happens outside their daily activities. Yet, surely children are participating in the world from the moment they are born (see Chawla 2001). Such questions, which are addressed in detail by the authors of the various case studies throughout the book, lead us to consider the ways we might make visible children’s participation in their world, rather than organizing their “participation” as if it can only occur if we adults name it and control it. Instead, opportunities for participation can be built around practices that are meaningful and empowering for children. We can talk about the role of children in participation in three forms: participation for children, participation with children, and participation by children. This contestation over the meaning and forms of participation from adults’ perspective (participation for children) in contrast to children’s perspective (participation by children) is taken up and illustrated well in a Welsh case study by Bert Jones. After a short piece on the various adult-centered youth activities found in many countries and cities that endeavor to engage young people in local political processes (i.e., youth councils, youth policy, youth forums, youth charters), he considers the many barriers to or constraints on participation. He comments that adults often interpret young people’s lack of sustained interest as an inability to take responsibility and therefore they are not to be trusted. He also acknowledged the reluctance of many of the youth workers in Wales to engage in meaningful participation and empowerment practices. He does state in his conclusion, however, that despite this cynicism, there does seem to be an easing of some 305 of these barriers based on a “paradigm shift in the minds of...

Another white elephant? Youth councils as democratic structures

UK society has probably never witnessed the kind of activism now emerging to tackle the roots of age-based discrimination and inequality. Everyone appears to be consulting and listening to children. The most favoured response by statutory and voluntary agencies for encouraging children and young people's participation has been the setting up of youth councils. This paper considers the extent to which youth councils enable participatory citizenship and democratic participation. In so doing, the commonplace suggestion that young people exhibit a lack of enthusiasm for involvement in ‘political’ matters and issues of local representation is challenged. The concept of active citizenship is mobilised to highlight particular ethical and methodo logical issues that need to be addressed at a local level if successful partner ship working that includes young people is to be achieved.

Taking the Lead: Dorothy Williams, NAACP Youth Councils, and Civil Rights Protests in Pittsburgh, 1961-1964

Born of humble circumstances on Independence Day, 1927, Dorothy Williams went on to help ignite a movement to free her people, African Americans, from racial discrimination in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A career elementary school teacher in Pittsburgh's public schools, her bold leadership as adult advisor to the youth division of the Pittsburgh National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) heralded the beginning of a sustained period of militant, direct action protest by African Americans in Pittsburgh--a movement that continued for years after Williams's premature withdrawal from civil rights activity. An effective organizer of young people, she also astutely captured the political mood of a large segment of the African American community by choosing the right issue around which to mobilize--job discrimination--and utilizing the direct action tactics that had been successful for African Americans in other parts of the country. Born and raised Dorothy Kendrick in Aliquippa, Pennsylvania, for most of her life, she would be known by the last name of her second husband, Robert Williams, even though the marriage only lasted about five years. The Kendricks moved to Pittsburgh's Hill District when Dorothy, the youngest of five daughters, was twelve years old. The future Dorothy Williams would develop a love affair with the Hill that would last a lifetime; other than the time she spent at college, Williams only lived outside of Pittsburgh's Hill District for one year. (1) Her parents Allen and Martha Kendrick had originally migrated from rural Georgia, where Dorothy's father farmed while his wife in a one-room school, grades one through eight, outside of Macon. Martha did not teach school in Pennsylvania, but she decided that her youngest daughter would. Teaching was a practical profession; it would allow Dorothy to make enough money to be her own woman, as Mrs. Kendrick used to say. In addition to steering her toward a teaching career, Williams credits her mother for the intense drive and fighting spirit--the will to win--that served her so well as a youth organizer and civil rights activist in the early 1960s. Less than one month after Dorothy left Pittsburgh to attend Cheyney State Teachers College, a historically black school outside of Philadelphia, her mother died. (2) Williams graduated from Cheyney in 1950 with a bachelor's degree in elementary education and returned to Pittsburgh to care for her father, who had become ill. In 1953 she accepted a teaching position at A. Leo Weil Elementary School in the Hill. Williams loved Weil, where she stayed until retiring from teaching in 1994. During her entire teaching career she spent only one year at another school, Letsche, which was also located in the Hill. (3) SEGREGATION AND DISCRIMINATION IN PITTSBURGH African Americans in post-World War II Pittsburgh where Dorothy Williams grew up and taught experienced severe racial discrimination in virtually every aspect of life. Between 1930 and 1960, Pittsburgh's black population increased by more than 45,000 to 100,000. During that same period, the number of majority black census tracts rose from six to twenty-three, thanks to racially inspired residential segregation. (4) Segregated housing led to segregated public schools. The problem was compounded by white flight to parochial schools in neighborhoods with a high or increasing concentration of black students. (5) By the end of the 1950s, African Americans made up about 15 percent of the city's population, but accounted for almost one-third of students enrolled in Pittsburgh's public schools. One-half of all black students attended schools with 80 percent or higher black enrollment. (6) Segregated schools led to unequal education. In 1959 the Pittsburgh Commission on Human Relations found the overwhelming majority of the city's classes for slow learning and retarded children to be located in schools with 80 percent or higher black enrollment. …

Youth Emerge as the Newest Community Partners

Children, Youth and Environments Vol 13, No.1 (Spring 2003) ISSN 1546-2250 Youth Emerge as the Newest Community Partners Ramona Mullahey American Planning Association A free society needs constantly to consider and discuss its present reality in the light of its past traditions and where it wants to go. - Robert N. Bellah et al., Habits of the Heart Forward–thinking cities such as Hampton, Las Vegas, and Louisville are examples of municipalities who are helping to define that future by making a “seat at the table” for youth by engaging them in local decision-making processes. Hampton, Virginia has two part-time Youth Planners on staff in the city’s planning department who are responsible for the youth component in the city’s comprehensive plan. Las Vegas, Nevada has a Youth Neighborhood Association Partnership Program that provides mini-grants and skills training in neighborhood improvement. Louisville, Kentucky has a system of Neighborhood Youth Boards and a Youth Cabinet shaping the city’s public policy agenda. These communities are creating a common culture of youth participation bolstered by advocates, like the National League of Cities, committed to broadening the base of community leadership and policy-making to include young people. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) HOPE VI office continues to take the bold path of providing tools for at risk youth living in severely distressed public housing to voice their ideas and concerns on the redevelopment of their communities and to learn creative problem solving. HUD offers a platform for youth to acquire the skills of leadership so they can effectively participate in improving their homes, their quality of life, and their opportunities for a future. This past January, the Local Government Commission, a Sacramento-based non-profit, with supporters like the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, for the second year, selected youth delegates from across the country as the newest Partners in the New Partners for Smart Growth conference discussion. Besides learning smart growth principles and the community planning process, youth leaders share their unique perspectives, experience, enthusiasm, and commitment to make a difference in the world. As they take their place at the “planning table”, they develop action plans for integrating their new knowledge back home in their neighborhoods. As more cities, towns, and neighborhoods take strategic actions to launch programs for youth engagement, we will see more youth appointed to youth councils, municipal boards and 230 commissions, or hired as staff interns in city departments, or collaborate on youth mapping projects, or commit to youth community service projects. As youth delegates shared at the close of last year’s Smart Growth conference, “We are not saying hold our hand, what we are saying is open the door for us and give us the tools, and we will wildly exceed your expectations.” And succeed they have. Following the Hope VI Youth Leadership for Change Summit, held at the University of California at Berkeley in August 2002, these young leaders returned home armed with new knowledge and ready to put their social enterprise plans into action. Dozens of youth– driven projects have been developed. In Seattle, youth residents of the Park Lake Homes community operate a Bubble Bliss tea cart to earn money, gain valuable work experience, and, to reinvest in themselves and their business. Oakland youth helped to redesign a mini-park across of public housing development, and are currently creating a video to present the project to potential funders. Over the past few years, cultivating youth as the newest community partners has gained startling momentum. We are definitely developing the infrastructure for successful collaboration between youth and their adult allies in many venues. Lives are being transformed as the civic capacity for both youth and adults are being expanded, and expectations surpass anyone’s imagination. Ramona K. Mullahey is a professional planner committed to the development of healthy communities and civic empowerment. She has been the American Planning Association's (APA) national advocate for involving young people in planning since 1989. She edits the APA's online magazine, Resources Zine, (www.planning.org) a compendium of programs, best practices, and tools that nurture youth leadership in shaping the places they live. ...

Author Response to Youth Participation in Community Planning: A Framework for Youth Empowerment

Children, Youth and Environments Vol 13, No.1 (Spring 2003) ISSN 1546-2250 Author Response to Youth Participation in Community Planning A Framework for Youth Empowerment Yve Susskind Vashon Island Youth Council Since the publication of Youth Participation in Community Planning, I have completed the research on which the two in-depth case studies were based. Four years ago several teenagers and I, from the small island community in Puget Sound where I live, started a youth-led activist organization where we had the opportunity to test the findings of the research. In that time, several other important pieces of research and theory have been published which help to further ground the ideas which I see emerging. I call the work that we are involved in “youth empowerment.” While the term “empowerment” is over-used (and often wrongly and manipulatively used, as when corporations call their teen marketing research empowerment), it does have a meaning which I have found fits well with the community change work that young people and their adult allies are doing: empowerment is both the increase in the capacity of an individual, group or community to create change as well as the process and outcomes of actual change in the conditions that oppress people, resulting in an enduring redistribution of power and resources. Based on my research and the recent work of others, I offer a framework for planners who want to begin involving young people in ways that empower participants, organizations and communities. This framework has three components: the activities of the participants, the characteristics of the settings in which participation takes place, and conditions in the larger community that allow empowered youth participation to take place. As a planner, what can you expect the young people that you work with to do? Whether youth working with planners on community designs, serving on local commissions, or engaging in their own youth-initiated social change efforts, empowerment takes place when young people are targeting significant community needs by addressing root causes of problems, and using multiple and appropriate forms of activism (which could be anything from advocacy, to planning, to civil disobedience and direct action).They are not working in isolation, but are connected to and part of public dialogue and decision making . They are not operating solely on their hunches and preconceived ideas, but are using history to understand and inspire and they are researching their issues to develop sophisticated analyses. Perhaps most challenging for adult allies who are trying to fit youth participation into their existing institutional structures, empowering youth involvement is a continuing and ongoing process, not a one-time event. Recent empirical research has also shown that certain structures are in place where young people’s participation in community change processes leads to empowerment. These settings are democratically managed. To the greatest extent possible, given each participant’s level of development, skill and knowledge as well as desired role, these projects use cooperative decision making processes that include youth fully and equally; young people initiate, design, manage and implement efforts. Partnership with adults is essential as adults share their knowledge, experience, contacts and access to power. In addition to these structures of 232 leadership and decision making, such projects offer support for young people’s personal, social and activist needs. Young people, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, often do not have access to the personal supports that adult workers take for granted, such as transportation and food. Projects often pay youth stipends, create opportunities for socializing, and, when necessary assist in accessing health or social services. Perhaps most importantly, such projects prioritize learning. They expect that people will learn and they value individual and organizational change that result from people’s learning, and deliberately create formal and informal opportunities for learning. It also appears that when all participants are considered learners, and the organization is set up as a learning laboratory, that everyone’s knowledge, expertise, and contribution is valued. These programs recognize that for some participants to fully learn and contribute, there must be deliberate investment in the capacity of underserved and under-represented youth. A question of particular interest to urban planners, and one which has not yet been adequately...

Campaña de prevención del consumo de alcohol en jóvenes «3 × 1: sin alcohol disfrutarás el triple»

ObjectiveTo offer leisure time activitiesthat are not related with alcohol consumption.To offer preventive information on the consumptionof alcohol and other substances through audiovisualmeans in time and places of young people'sleisure time, involving the leisure time sites(pubs, bars, etc.) and all the juvenile associative sitesin activities for alcohol consumption preventionamong the juvenile population. Material and methodsThe activity is planned forthe week ends that we know there are more influx ofyoung people in the leisure time sites. The waiterswill provides «vouchers» in those bars/pubs (previouslyagreed upon) when the young people ask fora drink without alcohol. These «vouchers» give themthe right to a free connection in the Multimedia Hall, the free use of the Municipal Sport's Center facilitiesor to an outside activity in the youth council. ResultsThe experience was put into practice indecember 1999 and december 200. Year 1999: No. ofleisure time sites involved: 4, No. of participatingyouth associations: 2, No. of tickets distributed: 7738,No. of participants in the activities: 631. YEAR 2000:No. of leisure time sites involved: 29, No. of participatingyouth associations: 2, No. of tickets distributed:10,000, No. of participants in the activities: 201. ConclusionsThis project has made intramunicipalcollaboration possible: Integral Center of DrugAddict Care, Health foundation, Youth Council,Sports Foundation and Leisure Time Sites. The evaluationof the first experience leads us to extend theoffer of the campaign to a greater number of sites.The members of the associations are those whomake the subsequent work of sensitization and follow-up of the campaign on the weekends: distributionof posters, providing of vouchers for the waiters,participation of the young people, etc. Theyouths can use their leisure time in activities that arenot related with alcohol consumption as long as thereis a suggestive, attractive and permanent offer.

« Autrement c’est possible » : les conseils de la jeunesse

Differently, it is possible : youth councils Differently, it is possible : Young people and institutions was the topic of the first Festival of citizenship organised jointly by the youth councils and the Ministry of Youth and Sports in March 2000. The desire of an alternative was apparently at the origin of the implementation of a ministerial policy of dialogue with young people in January 1998. The increase of such instances of consultation seems to draw a new framework of youth participation in public life. But what does it mean in facts ? A look at the first steps of the youth councils highlights that the sole political good-will is insufficient to succeed.

Fermanagh Shadow Youth Council: Youth Participation in Decision Making

Fermanagh Shadow Youth Council is a group of young people elected in official proportional representation elections in the county's post-primary schools; organised by district council staff, the election involves the use of polling booths and official ballot papers and the final count is held in the town hall. Young unemployed people are trained as presiding officers and, once elected, young shadow councillors meet in the town hall. The remit of the young people is to represent their age group to organisations wishing to consult them on further projects in response to issues raised by voters.

Citizenship, Youth Councils and Young People's Participation

This article focuses upon what has become the most favoured response by statutory and voluntary agencies for encouraging youth participation at a local level within the UK—the setting up of youth councils. Adults often establish youth councils largely because they are perceived to provide tangible opportunities deemed to enable ongoing participation by young people rather than because of demand from young people themselves. Emerging evidence suggests, however, that many youth forums are flawed and inappropriate participatory devices, often obfuscating the voices of many young people in local decision making. The article provides a brief review of the development of youth councils in the UK; examines the varying form and type of these different forums; and, drawing upon the views and voices of youth delegates, explores their perceived strengths and weaknesses. An evaluation of the efficacy of youth councils as participatory structures is offered.

Youth Council

Youth Council

Middle Level Reform: The Impact on Student Achievement

In 1989, the Carnegie Council on Adolescent Development released Turning Points: Preparing American Youth for the 21st Century, a major report on the status of middle school children with recommendations for improvement. This report prompted the Carnegie Corporation and the Council of Chief State School Officers to launch a state grant program entitled the Middle Grade School State Policy Initiative (MGSSPI). Of the 45 applications submitted, 27 states including North Dakota were selected to receive planning grants.Carnegie's goals for the MGSSPI were to promote change in state policies that would allow local schools to initiate and sustain fundamental reform, leading toward systematic, statewide reform and design of strategies to address the needs of educationally disadvantaged youth (Council of Chief State School Officers, 1993).This study examines the impact of implementation of middle school practices on student achievement in North Dakota MGSSPI schools. Findings indicate changes in composite grade equivalent scores from grade 6 to grade 8 were higher in the areas of reading vocabulary, language mechanics, study skills, science, and social studies in participating schools than in non-participating schools.

The right to say: the development of youth councils/forums within the UK

Summary Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child makes explicit reference to children's right to say what they think about matters relating to the quality of their lives, and to have those opinions taken into account in accordance with their levels of competence and maturity. Despite the commitment of the UK Government to this and other similar initiatives designed to empower young people, a culture of non‐participation is endemic within the UK in the context of environmental planning. Young people are seemingly invisible on the landscape. This paper reviews the case for children's active involvement in their environmental future and considers attempts to engage young people through an incipient structure of youth councils and forums.

Reclaiming their future!

The Kwazulu-Natal Youth Council talks about youth's vulnerability to HIV/AIDS and their plans to organise around the issues raised by the epidemic

Head of a Movement or Arms of the State?

ABSTRACT This paper examines the changing form of state and federal youth councils in Australia and the role of young people in them, in response to changing social and economic conditions. It argues that they were more instruments of state policy than leaders of a national youth movement. Emerging in the Second World War youth councils resourced youth organisations to maintain morale and social order and prepare young men for military service. Though youth delegates were included, councils were dominated by adult elites from traditional youth agencies. Following the war, emphasis moved from control to citizenship, but attempts to establish a British style youth service focused on social and leisure time education were unsuccessful. With the outbreak of the Cold War, conflict with left wing youth organisations escalated. A National Youth Council was finally established to give young Australians access to international forums. Traditional organisations dominated and delegates had difficulty in reconciling ...

CATHOLIC YOUTH MISSION IN TONGA

For the last four years one of the great challenges for Catholic youth in Tonga has been making a choice for life. The Vocational Awareness Programme encourages them to seek their vocation first for religious life and then for married life. In June 1990, the Council of Catholic Leaders set up a new programme called A to Mission. This means that the youth teams were going out and running seminars, retreat or renewal workshops for the youth of their own levels. It was very hard the first time to change the attitudes and perceptions that held that only the priests, brothers, nuns and some lay people can do these things. There was a lot of confusion as to whether they accepted the team or not. We put our trust in prayer and asked the Holy Spirit to lead us. The youth chaplain is a young priest who understands our weaknesses. We found it hard to face the youth of our own level. So the youth chaplain asked for permission from the bishop to join us on our first mission to the outer islands. After running these seminars in the outer islands we felt more confident to tackle the main islands. All the seminars we have are like miracles because we leave everything to the Holy Spirit. At the end of the seminar we wait for the evaluation to see how the participants responded to the seminar. What a great joy within us when we got the spirit of Youth to Mission. The participants shared; they had never experienced any spirit like that in the past. We felt that it was true because the team recounted deeply their own experiences, and shared their private thoughts. The team talked openly and everyone was free to ask questions. Some questions were hard to answer and the priest had to help us. Our most difficult experience was in 1990, the door to door visits for which we had prepared a lot of questions to put to the parents. More than half the parents were negative towards the youth group. For me this experience was a miracle, and now the Youth to Mission is extended into different areas. Today we have four teams, each with its own responsibility. The first team does the leadership training and counselling in the outer islands, which are twenty in number. The second team looks after the retreats of the senior classes of the Catholic colleges. The third team looks after the Vocational Awareness Programme. There is one vocation weekend every three months. The participants number more than one hundred since they come from both main and outer islands. The last team looks after the workshops on AIDS, drugs, reproductive health, family planning, environment, project proposals and preparing for married life. The council is comprised of forty-eight members, compared to only sixteen in 1990. The council spends one weekend every month to come together for prayer, inputs, sharing, presentations, and building the spirit of team work. On that weekend we invite a lot of guest speakers to give us input, and that is how we get our resources now. In addition, the youth chaplain and the co-ordinator collect and compile resources. Our mission has now changed. In 1990, ninety percent of our mission was within the church, and ten percent outside. In 1993, only sixty percent of our mission was within the church, and forty percent outside. Our external mission is formed by ecumenical youth contacts and the Tongan National Congress, both of which work together. What we try to build up in Youth to Mission is an individual with a spirit, that through baptism, he/she gets a right to share Christ's prophets, kings and priesthood. We are preparing ourselves to go and proclaim the good news. All the youth that started in 1990 are now married or chose priesthood and religious life. They are the hope of the church. It is clear now that they are very active in their own parishes. In the youth council there are eight volunteer members. On 5 April 1994, a team of four (two boys and two girls) members were willing to take the first Youth to Mission Programme to Niuatoputapu. …