Publications

Understanding Youth Leadership Development: An examination of the Youth Engaged in Leadership and Learning Program (Issue Brief)

Realizing the Potential of Community-University Partnerships (Magazine Article)

A Model for Fostering Youth Leadership: The Youth Engaged in Leadership and Learning Program (Issue Brief)

Building Bridges: A Summer Program for Middle School Students Highlights a Community School in Action (Issue Brief)

Integrating Technology into Community Youth Research (Issue Brief)

Youth Empowerment the Contributions and Challenges of Youth-Led Research in a High-Poverty, Urban Community (Issue Brief)

Creating Community change: Challenges and Tensions in Community Youth Research (Issue Brief)

Youth Civic Engagement - Annotated Bibliography

YELL Curriculum, 2nd Edition

This curriculum is designed for school, program, and community leaders to support authentic youth participation, promote effective policies and practices to strengthen communities, and support young people's personal growth.

For a hard copy (including binder) of the YELL curriculum, please contact Marianne Chatterton at mfchatte@stanford.edu. The cost per hard copy is $40 and includes domestic shipping. Additional shipping costs will be added to international orders.

To download the handbook for free, please click on the following links for individual sections (.pdf opens in new browser windows):

Please take a moment to let us know who you are and to share your response to this tool. We value your feedback. Please send your comments to Mary Hofstedt at hofstedt@stanford.edu

What is YELL?

YELL is a set of curricular resources available to anyone interested in training and engaging youth as partners and leaders within their communities. The JGC’s YELL Handbook can help you to:

Embed youth leadership training in authentic, meaningful projects that youth define and implement;
Develop basic youth leadership skills in communications, facilitation, teamwork, and understanding of change-making processes;
Train youth as community researchers and advocates, including the use of youth-driven research to inform the decisions of school leaders, city leaders, councils, and commissions;
Prepare youth for success in real leadership positions, including as mentors, grant-makers and evaluators within youth-serving organizations as well as on school and community leadership teams and advisory boards; and
Initiate and plan youth and adult volunteer initiatives, public art projects, community forums, and intergenerational events.

The YELL Handbook, with over 300 pages of structured agendas and planning resources, is available for free download. This resource is currently used to support youth leadership development and action in a variety of contexts throughout the United States, as well as in international settings.

YELL History and Development

The JGC initiated YELL in 2000 as a nine month after school pilot-program that trained 15 eighth grade students as community researchers, advisors, and socially conscious leaders. With JGC program staff, embedded researchers, school and community partners, and youth themselves contributing to program development, YELL expanded to include 350 middle school and high school youth in two Bay Area communities over the next six years. In 2006, JGC transitioned YELL program leadership to schools and community based organizations in Redwood City and West Oakland. While the JGC no longer runs YELL programs directly, the JGC embeds the YELL approach and curriculum in many of its community-based projects.

Positive Outcomes for Youth, Adults, and Communities

The JGC researched the impacts of YELL on participating youth, adults and settings. Research highlights three important ways that YELL promotes youth leadership skills: (1) fostering strong communication skills by valuing young people’s ideas and opinions; (2) encouraging analytic thinking through a research-based approach to social change; and (3) creating multiple opportunities for positive community involvement. The combination of these three leadership skills is essential for YELL’s success with young people. Adults and communities also directly benefit from the program. Adults develop relationships and partnerships with young people, knowledge of youth strengths, and skills to support youth as contributors to community solutions. Communities benefit from youth driven data and recommendations for decision-making, engaged and competent youth, and youth and adults who can work together on shared interests and agendas.

YELL Publications

Chapters

Winter 2006 Strobel, K., Osberg, J., and McLaughlin, M. “Participation in Social Change: Shifting Adolescents’ Developmental Pathways” In Gingwright, S., Noguera, P., and Cammarota, J. (Eds). Beyond Resistance: Youth Activism and Community Change: New Democratic Possibilities for Policy and Practice for America’s Youth

Spring 2005 Kirshner, B., O’Donoghue, J., and McLaughlin, M. “Youth Adult Research Collaborations: Bringing youth voice to the research process” In Larson, R., Eccles, J., and Mahoney, J. (Eds). Organized Activities as Contexts of Development: Extracurricular activities, after-school and community programs

Journal Articles
Spring 2007: Osberg-Conner, J.H. & Strobel, K. R. (2007). Leadership Development: An Examination of Individual and Programmatic Growth. Journal of Adolescent Research

Spring 2007: Kirshner, B. “Guided Participation in Youth Activism” Journal of Learning Sciences

Spring 2006: Society for Research on Adolescence- Directivity and Freedom: Adult Support of Activism Among Urban Youth

Summer 2006: Kirshner, B. “The Social Formation of Leadership in a Youth Activism Group” published in the proceedings of the International Conference of the Learning Sciences

Spring 2003: Kirshner, B., Strobel K., and Fernández M. “Critical Civic Engagement Among Urban Youth” PENN GSE Perspectives on Urban Education, Vol. 2, Issue 1

Youth Engaged in Leadership and Learning (YELL)