Institutionalizing Youth Voice

Becoming part of a system, integrating throughout a culture and tying together broad resources can ensure that Youth Voice is sustainable. That process is called institutionalization, and it represents the process of making a concept, social role, values, norms or behaviors part of an organization, social system or society. We need nothing less than to see that effort as essential to Youth Voice. The following are steps that groups, organizations, and communities can use as a guide to institutionalize Youth Voice.

Organizations will have...

• Processes to carry out the policies that support the objectives of goals of Youth Voice;
• Policies supporting Youth Voice activities have been published in a document available to youth, adult allies, youth workers, government officials, politicians and families;
• Data related to Youth Voice as it affects the young people involved, their peers, adult allies, and the larger community is regularly collected/
• Budgets include line items that support the implementation of Youth Voice activities;
• Regular training that orients new youth participants and adults and strengthens existing youth and adult allies' skills, knowledge and commitment to Youth Voice;
• Reporting procedures to ensure the Youth Voice coordinator reports to a high-level administrator and the position is incorporated into the organizational chart;
• Ongoing support for the Youth Voice program in order to ensure survival after a significant change of leadership among youth, adult allies and within the group, organization and/or community;
• Community connections that engage other groups, organizations and/or communities in designing, implementing, sustaining and/or evaluating their Youth Voice activities through conferences, workshops and/or local outreach.

These are initial steps that have shown are the most effective ways to institutionalize Youth Voice.

Interview on Adultism

The following is my response to an interview request I received from the UK last week. I thought I'd share some of my responses with you, as I think this is some of the most salient writing I've done on adultism lately. Let me know what you think.

1. Why do you think ageism towards young people is often ignored?

First, I believe it starts because it's not recognized for what it is. Ageism, which describes bias based on age, is different from adultism, which is the specific discrimination against youth that favors adults. It's important to distinguish these two, as the focus in young people can get lost in the larger conversation about age-based discrimination, which affects all ages to varying degrees.

Adultism can be easily ignored because it's not often recognized. The UK media picked up some studies on ephebiphobia last year that exposed the fear of youth driving a lot of your nation's older population moving houses as they age. This awareness can serve to increase sensitivity about ephebiphobia, which in turn can be used to increase awareness about adultism. This type of wide-scale conciousness-raising is the first step towards challenging discrmination against youth.

Adultism has been allowed to become so predominant throughout our society because of the economically exploitable position children and youth have been assigned, both as consumers and as the objects if consumption. Let me know I'd you want me to explain that further.

2. In what ways do you think ageism occurs in young people?

Adultism, as it occurs in young people, is manifested through self-oppressive behaviors and attitudes, peer-focused bias and discrimination, and adultcentric acceptance, concurrence, and promotion of discrimination against other young people.

Adultism as it occurs towards young people is manifested through individual attitudes, cultural and structural barriers. I have written about this extensively on my blog at www.youngerworld.org.

3. Have you met young people who have been victims of age discrimination?

All young people are subjected to adultism, as discriminatory attitudes towards them are apparent in the attitudes of their parents, the behaviors of their doctors and the environments they're surrounded by from the moment of their birth- and before. Is all this discrimination bad? Absolutely not - it serves to promote safety and propogate cultural norms. However, it's mostly far from necessary. Consequently many opportunities to appropriately and necessarily reinvent society are lost every single moment of every single day because of adultism.

4. If so, how has it affected them?

Adultism causes detrimental effects that ripple throughout our lives. After being subjected by this tool of discrimination from our earliest ages it becomes ingrained in our personal identities and life beliefs. This can lead to a deeply suspicious age-awareness and an absence of consciousness about the effects of all forms of oppression in our lives. Given the fleeting nature of all of our positions as children and youth, many people seek to adapt to the reality of adultism by internalizing the negativity and perpetuating its dynamic, both as self-oppression and as peer-oppression. As we become adults the messages of age discrimination become so thoroughly embedded in our consciousness that many people lose their ability to distinguish from what is oppressive and what isn't. This makes adultist behaviors "okay," and as individuals we begin to move from our internalized messages to manifest external oppression towards young people.

Unfortunately, this is especially true as we become parents, youth workers, and teachers. While we are well-intended in our determination to "help kids", we lose our bearing on what actually helps them versus harms them. And while Draconian measures such as corporal punishment and behaviour modification schools continue to wane from the public spotlight, the simple fact of the matter is that age-discriminatory economic, political, educational, social and cultural landscapes of Western society. So adultism affects young people throughout their youth, throughout their society, and ultimately throughout their lives.

5. Do you think ageism in young people is more prevalent in males or females?

Adultism affects all people regardless of gender.

6. Why do you think this is?

Adultism is age-based favoritism shown towards adults that discriminates against youth. Gender is not part of this analysis.

7. How do you think young people feel about age discrimination?

I would ask young people what they feel about age discrimination, and often do. In my workshops with thousands of youth across the US in the last 10 years I have learned that the range of opinions varies as the backgrounds of youth vary; however, a few things stay constant. These include that once they understand it, almost all youth agree that adultism exists. Another is that adultism affects everyone. These things I've learned from young people themselves, and I still have more to learn.

Again, I'd love to hear what you think.

Diversity and Youth Voice

Engaging non-traditionally engaged young people is not a mysterious process - neither is it a foriegn, "Other"-oriented mystery, nor is it a process that you do the same every time. Identifying diversity is an important beginning, but along the way action is required. Following are important tips for young people and adults who want to act on what they know.

1. Transform sympathy to empathy. Don't feel for someone else. Find commonality and discover similarity before you try to do something for someone; if you can't, don't. Discrimination affects people for many more reasons than their age: race, class, gender, sexual orientation, religion, and academic performance affect whole communities everyday. Learning about discrimination in all its forms strengthens understanding about Youth Voice. After exploring discrimination, it is easier to understand why we should not do anything for young people; we should do it with them. This is the first step to honoring diversity among youth, particularly for adults, because young people are distinct from adults.

2. Take personal action, and encourage others to do the same. Identify your diversity and learn about how other people identify themselves. Everyone is affected by ignorance, and everyone can benefit from learning and doing more to support diversity. Encourage your peers, family, class, and community to examine and act to support diversity. Individual and collective action encourages deeper understanding about Youth Voice.

3. Challenge ignorance and examine assumptions. When a young person in your group says or does something that is hurtful, hateful, disrespectful, or biased, call it out. Either individually or as a group, call out what was said or done, discuss what or how it could be different, and commit to challenging the person or situation to changing. Talk about differences within your group. Encourage young people with mixed ethnic, racial, religious, educational, economic, or other backgrounds to examine how they are similar and different.

4. Acknowledge that discrimination affects all youth differently. Young people share a lot in common because of their age: curfews, no voting rights, and “No children without parents” signs in stores affect everyone under 18. There are differences, too: young people from low-income neighborhoods have different experiences than those from affluent communities. Identify, examine, and embrace these differences. Acknowledge those differences on your own and with young people.

5. Find diversity everyday. There is diversity in every group of young people. Talk about the diversity in daily life by exploring differences at home, at school, in spiritual beliefs, in appearances, in thinking, and other ways with your entire group. Share perceptions and learn (or unlearn!) from each other. Create opportunities for young people to dialog about Youth Voice with young people in foster homes, juvenile detention, drug treatment centers, and other areas. Bring young people to ethnic fairs, refugee resettlement centers, and other settings where they can be exposed, challenged, and engaged to incorporate diversity into Youth Voice.

Whether you're a middle class African American seeking to work with low-income American Indian community, or if you're a well-meaning white person working in the Global South, taking action to promote Youth Voice is necessary and can happen. However, it must happen with justice. These tips are the beginning.

Adapted from the Washington Youth Voice Handbook, copyright 2006 Adam Fletcher. All rights reserved.