Document Type
Article
Publication Date
5-25-2024
Publication Title
Children and Youth Services Review
Volume
163
Pages
1-47
Publisher Name
Elsevier
Abstract
his project draws from youth voices to develop theory about outcomes and change mechanisms in a cross-age mentoring out of school program with urban African American and Latine youth living in low-income communities. With instructors’ supports, African American and Latine mentors (N = 148, ages 14–20) in four U.S. urban, high-poverty communities of color mentored children weekly for an average of 16 sessions, followed by a debriefing session. Researchers used qualitative, participatory methods to elicit mentor perspectives about what made their program impactful. Diverse qualitative data were collected by staff and youth and analyzed thematically. Outcomes adolescent mentors deemed meaningful were 1) developing good character, specifically persistence, leadership and listening skills, patience, respectful collaborations, goal-oriented hopefulness, and more positive racial identities, and 2) building trustworthy, supportive relationships with mentees, peers, and instructors. Mechanisms mentors regarded as generating outcomes were 1) being active agents in program implementation and evaluation, and also contributing knowledge about themselves, and 2) the fulfillment of caring for community children, which youth regarded as a partial remedy for deprivations and injustices their communities experience. Differences in emphasis based on gender are described. Outcomes and generative mechanisms are discussed in relation to youths’ community cultural wealth. Comprehensively empowering youth to co-lead program development, implementation, evaluation and theorizing can improve the fidelity of scientific knowledge to youths’ strengths and priorities, and yield theories of intervention consonant with youths’ cultural wealth.
Recommended Citation
Tyson McCrea, Katherine; Wilkins, Kaleigh Valencia; Richards, Maryse; Onyeka, Ogechi; Miller, Kevin M.; Diclemente, Cara Marie; Moore, Amzie II; Watson, Heather L.; Gillis-Harry, Kassie; Jenkins, Gabriel; and Williams, Naquiria. “We got to stand up and speak”: Youth in high-poverty, high-crime urban communities of color reflect on their cross-age mentoring program. Children and Youth Services Review, 163, : 1-47, 2024. Retrieved from Loyola eCommons, Social Work: School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Other Works, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2024.107685
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Copyright Statement
© Elsevier, 2024.
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Comments
Author Posting © Elsevier, 2024. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here by permission of Elsevier for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Children and Youth Services Review, Vol. 163, (May 25, 2024), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2024.107685.