Building Healthy Communities for Positive Youth Development (The Search Institute Series on Developmentally Attentive Community and Society Book 7)

The Healthy Communities • Healthy Youth (HC • HY) project has provided grassroots support for the creation of robust, welcoming environments not only for children and adolescents at risk but for all youth. __Building Healthy Communities for Positive Youth Development__ explains the Developmental Assets framework in depth and demonstrates how eight local initiatives across the country have adapted and implemented it to fit the unique cultures and resources of their neighborhoods and the needs and strengths of their young people. Stakeholders collaborating in the process include parents, educators, politicians, service providers, law enforcement, volunteers, and—as active participants instead of merely recipients of services—youth themselves. In this visionary book, the authors provide readers with a flexible, living blueprint for promoting the well-being of children and teenagers. Areas of coverage include: * Core themes of the eight HC • HY initiatives. * The use of an asset-based common language among participants. * Building common ground among the various sectors involved in the initiatives. * The varied roles of young people within the initiatives. * Research design and methodology; data collection and interpretation. * Funding issues and challenges. The mission outlined in __Building Healthy Communities for Positive Youth Development__ fits the interests of a wide range of professionals, including developmental psychologists; child, youth, and family service professionals; clinical child and school psychologists; and allied education and mental health practitioners working with children and adolescents. Series Preface 6 Acknowledgments 8 Contents 10 About the Authors 14 1 Introduction 16 Eight Interpretations of the Developmental Assets Framework 16 Specifics of the Developmental Assets Framework and the HC HY Initiative 17 The National Asset-Building Case Study Project 21 Research Design and Methodology: Developing an Ethnographically Informed Perspective 21 Site Selection 22 Qualitative Instrumentation 23 Analysis: Deriving Data-Driven Interpretations 24 Unfinished Collaborations, Dynamic Processes 25 2 Transformation, Affirmation, and Blended Models 26 Organizing Themes and Concepts 27 Catalyzing the Transformation of Community Norms: The Core Theme 28 The New Norm 29 Representation 31 Cultural Identity Development 34 The Faith Factor 36 Resisting the Mission 37 Personal Ownership 39 Does It Matter? 40 Catalytic Context 42 Synergistic Commitment 45 Leadership Wisdom 47 Shaking Up the Status Quo 48 Reaching a Common Ground 50 Paradoxical Tensions 52 Conclusion and Implications 53 3 Strategic Care, Sector by Sector: Traverse Bay Areas GivEm40 24.7 56 Context of the Initiative 56 Structural Features of the Initiative 57 Characterizing Themes 58 Leadership Wisdom 58 Strategic Care 58 Leadership Determination: The Element of Risk Taking 60 Leadership Resistance 61 Sector-Deep Representation 63 One Sector at a Time 64 It...s Simple, But ... 65 Beyond the Schools 66 Tenuousness and Survival 68 Spread Control 69 Postscript 70 4 The Forgotten Neighborhoods: Moorhead, Minnesotas Healthy Community Initiative 72 Context of the Initiative 72 Structural Features and Orientation 75 Focus on Out-of-School Time 75 New Director 76 Tension with Fargo and Partnership Potential 76 Characterizing Themes 78 Cultural Identity Development 78 Adapting Funding Frameworks 79 A Guiding Story of Financing Innovation 80 Branding and the Complexities of Recognition 81 Lack of Sector Diversification and ''Providing for..." 82 Representation 83 A Strong Start in Building Representation 84 Forgotten Neighborhoods, Forgotten Youth 85 Are We Doing What We Set Out to Do? 86 The Element of Risk Taking 87 Postscript 88 5 Pursuing The Tipping Point: Portland, Oregons Take the Time Initiative 90 Context of the Initiative 90 ''Death by Reorganization'' 91 Structural Features and Orientation 92 Characterizing Themes 93 Personal Ownership 94 Reaching a Common Ground 95 Egalitarian Context 96 Spreading the Word: Successes and Setbacks 97 Youth Advocacy for Balanced Media Coverage 98 Parent Outreach 99 Community Change: Person by Person, Mistake by Mistake 100 Postscript 102 6 Community Sustainability: Orlandos Healthy Community Initiative 104 Context of the Initiative 104 Structural Features and Orientation 105 Characterizing Themes 106 Synergistic Commitment: Initiatives within an Initiative 106 Not Slamming the Schools 108 Virtual Communities 109 Leadership Wisdom: HCI's Distributed Leadership Model 110 White Guys Over 50 111 Youth as Civic Leaders 112 Fit of the Model 114 Developmental Assets as the ''Lever'' 114 The Role of Community Faculty 114 Closing Thoughts 115 Postscript 115 7 We Are Not a Program St. Louis Park, Minnesotas Children First Initiative 116 Redefining the Catalytic Context 117 Distinguishing Features of Children Firsts Identity 118 Structural Organization: Vision Team and Executive Committee 123 The Desire to be Invisible 123 Sector Connection and Representation 124 Defining Achievements and Challenges of Children First 126 Transience and the Challenge of Diversity for Children First 129 Revisiting the Crossroads: Initiative or Program? 131 Implications 133 Postscript 134 8 Partnering with Prevention: The Lawton/Fort Sill, Oklahoma, Community Coalition 136 The Lawton/Fort Sill Community and Comanche County 137 Coalition Features 138 Strategic Funding 138 Organizational Structure: A Nested Prevention Network 140 Characterizing Themes 141 Representation and Shaking Up the Status Quo 141 The Role and History of Diversity in LFSCC 141 Sector Diversity 143 Fort Sill: The Military Sector 143 Education 144 All Kids 145 Elder Involvement 145 City Government 146 Lagging and Lapsed Representation 146 Blended Models of Community Change 147 The Contribution of the Lawton/Fort Sill Community Coalition to the HC HY Movement 151 Postscript 152 9 Leaderful Communities: The McPherson, Kansas, Tri-County Asset-Building Initiative 154 Community Features: Natural Resources and Foresight 155 Competing Resources: Oil and the Aquifer 156 The Power Utilities Story: Entrepreneurship and Risk 157 A Chamber of Commerce for Business and Youth Development 158 Developmental Assets and the Chamber of Commerces Mission 160 The Kansas Health Foundation: Servant Leadership and Childrens Health 161 Key Activities and Achievements 164 Connecting the Counties 164 Tri-County Differences: The Emergence of Paradigm Clashes 165 McPherson-Specific Projects: Focusing the Lens 166 Growth and Preservation: Not Losing What You Already Have 168 Postscript 170 10 The Next New Frontier: Nevadas Healthy Communities Coalition of Lyon and Storey Counties 172 Community Context: Grassroots Orientation with Global Vision 172 A Brief History of Northern Nevada Settlement 173 Juxtaposition of Natural and Commercial Resources 174 Initiative Features: A Nested Network of Collaboration 175 Leadership Roles 176 Sector Representation 177 Prevention and the HCC History of Coalition Building 179 Providing the Map 181 Early Awareness and the Appeal of Developmental Assets 181 Development of the Blended Model 182 Developmental Assets and Protective Factors 183 Applying and Assessing the Blended Model 184 Does It Matter? How Do We Know the Blended Model Works? 186 The New Frontier 187 Postscript 189 11 Project Postscript: Resisting the Template 190 Where to Start? 190 Key Bridges 192 Idiosyncrasies and Blended Models 193 Bibliography 196 Subject Index 198 Michael J. Nakkula, Ed.D., is a practice professor of education within the Division of Applied Psychology and Human Development at the University of Pennsylvania`s Graduate School of Education, where he serves as the director of a master`s program in school and mental health counseling. Nakkula teaches courses on adolescent development and the intersection of counseling, mentoring, and education within urban public schools. Prior to assuming his current faculty position, he was the longtime codirector of Harvard`s Risk and Prevention master`s program, where he designed and studied a number of initiatives that support the developmental opportunities for low-income youth. For this work he was named Harvard`s initial recipient of the Kargman Junior Chair for Human Development and Urban Education Advancement (1998-2004). Nakkula is the lead author (with Eric Toshalis) of Understanding Youth: Adolescent Development for Educators (Harvard Education Press, 2006), and is the coeditor of a special journal issue on the ways in which youth mentoring relationships are organized, assessed, and understood to promote best practices within different settings. He finds particular joy in helping to coach his sons` (Lukas and Sam) youth hockey and baseball teams. Karen C. Foster, Ed.D., is a former research associate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education where she enjoyed a longterm collaboration with Michael Nakkula. She trained in child and adolescent development at the former Cambridge Child Guidance Center and in the Behavioral Medicine department, also affiliated with The Cambridge Hospital, in Cambridge MA. Her early research was a study of Boston inner city students` experiences of stress and coping. She has spent the past four years as an external evaluator and consultant to the Ohio Board of Regents studying the impact of a state wide initiative to improve the quality of science and mathematics teacher education in the public schools. Her stint in Ohio provided a valuable opportunity to study the unique challenges to higher educational access posed by rural communities. The experience of working on the National Asset-Building Case Study Project was a primary force in shaping her deep interest in research approaches that authentically capture the work of social reforms. She has applied the model developed on the Case Study Project to other areas including immigrant healthcare practices, nutrition reform, service learning, and police profiling. Marc Mannes, Ph.D., currently leads the Chicago office of Booz Allen Hamilton, a strategy, operations, and technology consulting firm serving government clients. Marc spent a decade as director of applied research at Search Institute, where he oversaw the organization`s community research agenda and the extension of the Developmental Assets Frameworks to children. His career has focused on the intersections of applied research, policy formulation and implementation, program and product development, organizational and community change, and training. Mannes is coeditor and contributor to Balancing Family-Centered Services and Child Well-Being: Exploring Issues in Policy, Practice, Theory, and Research (Columbia University Press, 2001). He also served as a contributing author to Other People`s Kids: Social Expectations and American Adults` Involvement with Children and Adolescents (2003), also part of the Search Institute Series on Developmentally Attentive Community and Society. Mannes lives north of Chicago in Wilmette, Illinois, with his wife, Karen, and their two daughters, Lilia and Natalie. Shenita Bolstrom, MS, is a clinical research associate in the Neuromodulation business at Medtronic, Inc., global leader in medical technology, headquartered in Minneapolis, MN. Prior to joining Medtronic, Inc., she was field research coordinator at Search Institute, where she worked on research projects in the areas of community and social change, families and parenting, and youth development programs and practices. Shenita earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology and sociology from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and her master`s degree at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. When not at work, she`s out training for and completing marathons It is a great pleasure to offer this volume from Michael J. Nakkula, Karen C. Foster, Marc Mannes, and Shenita Bolstrom as the latest in the Search Institute Series on Developmentally Attentive Community and Society. Its importance to the series and this ?eld of inquiry and practice is readily evident in its title, Building Healthy Communities for Positive Youth Development. Since the early 1990s, Search Institute has invited and encouraged communities of all shapes and sizes to use its framework of Developmental Assets and principles of asset building to create strong, vibrant, and welcoming communities for children and youth. We have operated largely at the grassroots level, encouraging innovation and adaptation around a shared vision, rather than proposing a program or model for replication. We seek to learn as much from the communities as they learn from us. This book offers in-depth case studies of what happened in eight diverse c- munities that took up our invitation. In them, we see a wide array of strategies and approaches that, on the surface, seem to have little coherence. But, as Nakkula and colleagues found, underlying each of these distinct efforts was a deep commitment to transforming the social norms of community life to more effectively attend to young people’s healthy development throughout the ?rst two decades of life. There have been many ambitious efforts aimed at comprehensive community change on behalf of young people. "The Healthy Communities. Healthy Youth (HC. HY) project has provided grassroots support for the creation of robust, welcoming environments not only for children and adolescents at risk but for all youth. Building Healthy Communities for Positive Youth Development explains the Developmental Assets framework in depth and demonstrates how eight local initiatives across the country have adapted and implemented it to fit the unique cultures and resources of their neighborhoods and the needs and strengths of their young people. Stakeholders collaborating in the process include parents, educators, politicians, service providers, law enforcement, volunteers, and---as active participants instead of merely recipients of services---youth themselves." "In this visionary book, the authors provide readers with a flexible, living blueprint for promoting the well-being of children and teenagers. Areas of coverage include:" "The mission outlined in Building Healthy Communities for Positive Youth Development fits the interests of a wide range of professionals, including developmental psychologists; child, youth, and family service professionals; clinical child and school psychologists; and allied education and mental health practitioners working with children and adolescents."--BOOK JACKET. Front Matter....Pages i-xiv Introduction....Pages 1-10 Transformation, Affirmation, and Blended Models....Pages 11-39 Strategic Care, Sector by Sector: Traverse Bay Area’s GivEm40 24.7....Pages 41-55 The Forgotten Neighborhoods: Moorhead, Minnesota’s Healthy Community Initiative....Pages 57-73 Pursuing “The Tipping Point”: Portland, Oregon’s Take the Time Initiative....Pages 75-87 Community Sustainability: Orlando’s Healthy Community Initiative....Pages 89-100 We Are Not a Program! St. Louis Park, Minnesota’s Children First Initiative....Pages 101-120 Partnering with Prevention: The Lawton/Fort Sill, Oklahoma, Community Coalition....Pages 121-137 “Leaderful” Communities: The McPherson, Kansas, Tri-County Asset-Building Initiative....Pages 139-155 The Next New Frontier: Nevada’s Healthy Communities Coalition of Lyon and Storey Counties....Pages 157-174 Project Postscript: Resisting the Template....Pages 175-179 Back Matter....Pages 181-189