Positive Youth Development

This content include:

I.                  Principles of Positive Youth Development

II.               Goals

III.               Key features 

IV.           Using PYD to address stereotypes and inequality

Positive youth Development (Definition)

Positive Youth Development

Positive youth development (PYD) is an approach to working with youth that emphasizes building on youths’ strengths and providing supports and opportunities that will help them achieve goals and transition to adulthood in a productive, healthy manner. PYD is not a specific curriculum but a model that can be used to enhance any youth-serving program. At its core, PYD focuses on cultivating qualities that help adolescents thrive through relationships and environments that provide supportive connections and help to develop needed skills. Research shows that programs that incorporate a positive youth development approach can contribute to a range of positive outcomes among all adolescents, prevent a variety of risk behaviors, result in robust and sustained impacts, and have the potential to reduce health disparities.

Positive Youth Development (PYD) is both a philosophy and an approach to adolescent development. 

Definition of Positive Youth Development (PYD)

According to Youth Power Learning, “Positive youth development engages youth along with their families, communities and/or governments so that youth are empowered to reach their full potential. PYD approaches build skills, assets and competencies; foster healthy relationships; strengthen the environment; and transform systems.”

Principles of Positive Youth Development

Positive youth development is a framework that guides communities in the way they organize services, opportunities, and supports so that young people can develop to their full potential. Positive youth development is not just another program. Communities that adopt a youth development approach emphasize these principles:

• Focus on strengths and positive outcomes. Rather than taking a deficit-based approach, communities intentionally help young people build on their strengths and develop the competencies, values, and connections they need for life and work.
   
• Youth voice and engagement. Youth are valued partners who have meaningful, decision-making roles in programs and communities. 
• Strategies that involve all youth. Communities support and engage all youth rather than focusing solely on "high-risk" or "gifted" youth. Communities do, however, recognize the need to identify and respond to specific problems faced by some youth (such as violence or premature parenthood).
• Community involvement and collaboration. Positive youth development includes but reaches beyond programs; it promotes organizational change and collaboration for community change. All sectors have a role to play in making the community a great place to grow up.
• Long-term commitment. Communities provide the ongoing, developmentally appropriate support young people need over the first 20 years of their lives.

Goals

PYD focuses on the active promotion of optimal human development, rather than on the scientific study of age related change, distinguishing it from the study of child development or adolescent development or as solely a means of avoiding risky behaviors. Rather than grounding its developmental approach in the presence of adversity, risk or challenge, a PYD approach considers the potential and capacity of each individual young person. A hallmark of these programs is that they are based on the concept that children and adolescents have strengths and abilities unique to their developmental stage and that they are not merely "inadequate" or "undeveloped" adults. Lerner and colleagues write: "The goal of the positive youth development perspective is to promote positive outcomes. This idea is in contrast to a perspective that focuses on punishment and the idea that adolescents are broken".

Positive youth development is a vision, an ideology and a new vocabulary for engaging with youth development.  Its tenets can be organized into the 5 C's which are: competence, confidence, connection, character, and caring. When these 5 C's are present, the 6th C of "contribution" is realized.

Key features

Positive youth development programs typically recognize contextual variability in youths' experience and in what is considered healthy or optimal development for youth in different settings or cultures. This cultural sensitivity reflects the influence of Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory. The influence of ecological systems theory is also seen on the emphasis many youth development programs place on the interrelationship of different social contexts through which the development person moves (e.g. family, peers, school, work, and leisure).

The University of Minnesota's Keys to Quality Youth Development summarizes eight key elements of programs that successfully promote youth development. Such programs are physically and emotionally safe, give youth a sense of belonging and ownership and foster their self-worth, allow them to discover their "selves" (identities, interests, strengths), foster high quality and supportive relations with peers and adults, help youth recognize conflicting values and develop their own, foster the development of new skills, have fun, and have hope for the future. In addition, programs that employ PYD principles generally have one or more of the following features:

-       promote bonding

-       foster resilience

-       promote social, emotional, cognitive, behavioral, and moral competence

-       foster self-determination

-        foster spirituality 

-        Foster self-efficacy 

-        foster clear and positive Identity

-       foster belief in the future

-       provide recognition for positive behavior and opportunities for pro-social development

-        promote empowerment

-       foster pro-social norms

Using PYD to address stereotypes and inequality

Gender Equality

Positive youth development principles can be used to address gender inequalities through the promotion of programs such as "Girls on the Run." Physical activity-based programs like "Girls on the Run" are being increasingly used around the world for their ability to encourage psychological, emotional, and social development for youth. "Girls on the Run" enhances this type of physical activity program by specifically targeting female youth in an effort to reduce the gendered view of a male-dominated sports arena. "Girls on the Run" is a non-profit organization begun in 1996 that distributes a 12-week training program to help girls prepare for a 5k running competition. This particular program is made available to 3rd through 5th grade female students throughout the United States and Canada to be implemented in either school or community-based settings.

 Another example of positive youth development principles being used to target youth Gender inequalities can be seen in that of a participatory diagramming approach in Kibera, Kenya. This community development effort enabled participants to feel safe discussing their concerns regarding gender inequities in the community with the dominant male group. This approach also enabled youth to voice their needs and identify potential solutions related to topics like HIV/AIDS and family violence.

References

1.    oore, K. A. (2017). Commentary: Positive youth development goes mainstream. Child Development, 88(4), 1175-1177.

2.    Williams, Cheryl; Pamela Petrucka; Sandra Bassendowski; Claire Betker (2014). Ramsey, Dr. Doug (ed.). "Participatory diagramming for engaging youth in a gender equity and community development dialogue: An African exemplar". Journal of Rural and Community Development. 9 (2): 191–211. ISSN 1712-8277

3.    Zurcher, Tom; Walker, Joyce; Piehl, Barbara; Ogg-Graybill, Jolie; Morreim, Patricia; McAndrews, Betty; Matlack, Mary; Fruechte, Kari; Croymans, Sara R.; Brekke, Barbara; Almquist, Patricia (1999). "Keys to Quality Youth Development". hdl:11299/49534.

4.     Jump up to:^a b c Lerner, R.M.; Almerigi, J.B.; Theokas, C.; Lerner, J.V. (2005). "Positive Youth Development". Journal of Early Adolescence. 25 (1): 10–16. doi:10.1177/0272431604273211

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