Engaged Youth » All-ages movement, youth leadership

All-ages movement, youth leadership

September 19th, 2008 at 10:47am Toby Campbell Permalink

We are excited to have a few new advisors on board. In particular, Josh Powell, Program Director for the VERA Project, has joined our Civic Learning Team. I’d like to invite Josh and other interested bloggers to weigh in on the following:
What are the various ways organizations can foster youth governance and leadership and put power in the hands of the young people they serve?
In what ways do these types of organizations fit into the all-ages movement project, and what does this involvement mean?

Entry Filed under: adviser conversations, youth management

4 Comments Add your own

1. The Vera Project - Josh Powell | September 27th, 2008 at 7:23 pm

Before I start, I have to say that If You Don’t They Will already said everything I could hope to say, and in a way I never could! Their simple differentiation between organizing youth, and youth organizing is profound. I’m hard pressed to add more thoughts of value to their spectacular post, but I’ll try!
2. The Vera Project - Josh Powell | September 27th, 2008 at 7:31 pm

Youth governance, deconstructing hierarchies, power sharing… These ideas are stirring up excitement in a new generation of organizers. Old School nonprofits are taking note, and finding ways to bolster their missions with these values. Reading this, you’re likely looking for specific practices to engage youth in your organization’s leadership.

I’ve spoken with a number of organizers eagerly incorporating youth leadership into their work, but they’re finding that it’s harder than they expected. Often the story follows a pattern like this: an idea came from program staff; it was the perfect chance to solicit the help of a youth committee; the service was released for young people to consume, but participation was lackluster.

There is nothing inherently wrong with the philosophy of developing a service for young people to consume, and it’s all the better if young people are involved in defining what that service will be. Often, direct services, like shelters and food programs, are examples of where this philosophy might be the right approach (actually… how awesome would it be if youth shelters were governed by those they shelter!)

But truly putting power in the hands of young people means far more than adopting particular programs, policies, and practices. You have to decide whether you want to put the power of governance of the organization in the hands of young people, or have a youth empowerment program. I’m more interested in the former. It means an intentional change in the philosophy and culture of your entire organization. If your organization’s institutional practices don’t already reflect youth-led governance, then, in order to do so will require a drastic shift in power.

And that – power – is what it’s all about. Defining what power is, exactly, is so abstract that it’s hard to know where to begin, and then often brings up struggles for those afraid to relinquish it. It’s often simple things that manifest the most power, that draw the line between who has the power and who doesn’t. Here are two specific ways where everyday power is focused:

Decision making: And this doesn’t mean just a vote, like at your co-op. True decision making requires being privy to, and having a say in all conversations, all the way through that lead up to a vital decision. Consider the stereotypical philosophy – come up with a program idea, get youth input, deliver. The young people involved never had the say in the birthing of the idea – they’re working on somebody else’s project.

When board meetings are closed, then the future of the organization is a surprise to those it serves. The power of being privy to what is current and vital, and the power to have a say in the vision is closed off. But why are meetings and conversations so often private? Why is the power of decision making relegated to a select few, if not a single person?

The stereotypical philosophy says: Group process is cumbersome and frustrating, and to many, simply unbearable. Too many cooks in the kitchen, especially inexperienced cooks, botches up the process and slows things down.

Meeting conduct: Or rather, conduct in general. The generation gap is never so distinct as when you put a 14 year old student in a meeting about corporate sponsorship or profit and loss analysis alongside a 40 year old banking executive. Unless the culture of your organization, every individual involved, has confronted the pervasive ageism extant throughout everything, then you will never truly share power.

The stereotypical philosophy says: young people’s input is valid, but there are some arenas where they just aren’t experienced or knowledgeable enough yet, and we don’t want to throw them in over their heads.

So… in what ways can you foster youth governance and leadership, and put the power in the hands of young people?

• Give up power: And empower those involved! That’s the key, and it’s a hard thing to build momentum around. Power is difficult and intimidating, and most people don’t embrace it immediately. For a young person to step up to chairing a large committee, for instance, or to just participate in a board meeting is frightening. You have to do better than just giving up power, you have to encourage the potential in everyone involved, and envision how much they will bring to the mission. With strong leadership development opportunities, a respectful facilitation model, and a good philosophy, everyone involved will be happy! Read on!

• Facilitation for groups: Get trained in alternative facilitation skills and models that focus on group process, and make sure everyone is involved: (like open space
technology). Let groups govern themselves, step down from filling the roles of chair, or facilitator, or secretary, and give that power to those involved. For a real-life example, of genuine all-ages collaborative organizing in action, The Vera Project just completed our 2008-2013 Strategic Plan – written by an all-ages strategic planning committee, with the involvement of no less than 350 people - On time and on budget! Don’t hesitate to ask for a copy of our plan, as well as timeline’s and the tools we used to get there!

• Confront ageism: Learn together about how to recognize and combat ageism. Don’t shy away from conversations amongst yourselves, and the young people involved, about how ageism effects everybody (it does work both ways!), and how you can collectively overcome the obstacles ageism creates. Many trainings exist (especially in the field of anti-oppression) that specialize in ageism.

• Leadership Development: Not only do you need to put the existing power in the organization in the hands of the young people involved – but you have to give them the power to grow as well. Invest in leadership programs designed for young or culturally diverse groups (SOAR’s Multicultural Youth Leadership module, for instance!). Allow all people involved to collectively identify leadership skills they may be interested in – and make sure to budget for these ideas.

• Include young people throughout your organization: Commit to strategic committees led by young people that truly put the organization’s power in their hands. Present to them everything you present to the board: financials and budgets, funding sources, program numbers, partnership potentials. For another Vera example, we have a Programming Committee and a Steering Committee. Programming just collaboratively wrote our 2009 program goals (partnership goals and promotion strategy will be written at our next meeting), and Steering just went through a budget training and will approve the 2009 budget. And our full membership of 50 young people will collaboratively contribute to what will appear in our 2008 evaluation.

• And finally, for a genuine experience, think all-ages, and don’t keep ‘youth’ in the box the rest of our culture puts us in! All of the things I’ve written about in this post adds up to quite a load – but it is exciting work. It’s inspiring to see the transformation in those who work with you on a common vision, and the transformation in yourself. This all-ages movement means understanding and learning how to share power early in your life, and it means creating a connection between generations that our culture has driven a rift between. If you envision an entire society that embraces each other’s importance regardless of age, then these practices may be a good first step.
3. Toby Campbell | October 16th, 2008 at 6:00 pm

Josh, thank you for these insightful comments. This information about the all-ages movement can really help inform our discussions about the approach to youth development work we want to do with PSO. I have a couple of follow-up questions for you.

First, are there any local resources or trainings you’d recommend for PSO staff?

Second, how do you think we can all work to raise the visibility of organizations who put power in the hands of the young people they serve, and elevate the credibility of that practice in the eyes of more traditional funders?

I invite anyone to weigh in on these questions as well!
4. The Vera Project - Josh Powell | November 3rd, 2008 at 5:51 pm

Resources and trainings:

·
The
All-Ages Movement Project
has an excellent list of resources, I
suggest bookmarking their page and visiting often (and becoming one of their anchor organizations!)

·

The Innovation
Center has a wealth of resources online.

·
As does the
Movement Strategy Center

·
And The
Freechild Project

·
For workshops, I suggest
People’s Institute Northwest who offer a
2-day Undoing Institutional Racism intensive, these only happen a few times a
year so be sure to get in when they happen!
For an excellent example of UIR in action, see

SYPP’s Youth Undoing Institutionalized Racism Project.

·

Seattle Young People’s Project hosts regular trainings and workshops on
issues like Undoing Racism, Fighting Homophobia, Gender Justice, and Youth
Organizing 101 that you can get young folks in your program connected to.

·
Home Alive
caters various workshops to your organization around boundary setting and
conflict resolution,

·
Many learning opportunities happen at
conferences, for instance this
Arts and Civic Engagement
conference from the Alliance of Artists Communities.

·

Communities Against Rape and Abuse offer great workshops for youth

·
The
Northwest Network
offers great Trainings for Service Providers reaching out to LGBTQ audiences,
especially survivors of same-sex domestic violence

·
And, of course,
Christien Storm and
If You
Don’t, They Will give solid trainings!

There are a
lot more resources out there, but this is definitely a good start!