Community Youth Development Initiative
A typical community project includes seven steps:
- Explore possibilities
with ISU Extension staff
- Identify desired expectations
- Discuss financial considerations
- Review history related to proposed project
- Create a partnership agreement
- Conduct a community and organization readiness assessment
- Identify training modules to meet specific community needs
- Deliver training modules
- Examine outcomes
- Determine next step
- Readiness assessments
- Consultation and technical assistance to build youth/adult/organization cooperation
- Long-term support, training, and coaching
- Access to extended resources
- Certification for participants
Ideas
A community group may want to
- enhance knowledge and skills of youth workers
- develop opportunities to involve youth in local decision-making bodies
- create and implement a strategic plan for involving youth in community decision-making
- assess the level of understanding of position youth development
A school district may want help implementing its school improvement plan.
A youth agency may want to change the way its staff works with youth.
Examples
ISU Extension can help. Our specialists have
- helped students identify actions they could take to enhance student leadership (retreat requested by a school district)
- helped faculty identify ways they could enhance youth development (retreat requested by a school district)
- helped a community with strategic planning for youth development, including a vision of the community's future (requested by a local community character education council)
