Training Institutes 2012 - National Technical Assistance Center for ...

INSTITUTES
INSTITUTE #26 8:30 AM FRIDAY • 1:30 PM SATURDAY • TAMPA 1-2-3
Can You Hear Me Now? Effective Strategies for Youth Involvement
OBJECTIVES—Participants will learn:
1. To identify key components of youth involvement
2. To explain the lessons learned from youth organizations across the nation
3. Strategies for building and sustaining cross-system partnerships that enhance youth autonomy and ability to
participate in policy creation
4. To identify best practices in communication and technical assistance strategies to support youth involvement
5. How to implement culturally and linguistically competent ways to engage youth in their own recovery
6. To develop a white paper by participants using their strengths, experiences, and lessons learned for effective youth
involvement
7. To create a product in the form of a white paper created by the participants using their strengths, experiences and
lessons learned
This Institute will focus on effective strategies for engaging and involving youth in all aspects of service systems
and planning and delivering services. Faculty will share the history of the youth movement and help participants to
become a part of this movement by creating strategies and tools to promote youth involvement. The Institute is designed
for all stakeholders in systems of care, including youth and young adults, who are interested in increasing youth voice
and involvement.
The strategies for achieving the objectives rely upon incorporating varying experts on the facilitation team including
youth, families, and young adult perspectives in an interactive training geared towards sharing all participants’ points of
view. A “white paper” exercise will be created by participants as a tool for other building, funding, and sustaining youth
involvement in their local systems of care. Creation of an actual product such as a white paper will improve stakeholder
buy-in and provides a way to pass on lessons learned from all parts of the nation.
Many of the strategies to be shared are based on the experience of members of Youth ’N Action in Washington which
has been one of the first youth organizations recognized on a national level as a system of care youth organization.
The specific topics to be covered include:
• Technical assistance
• Communication
• Funding
• Building and sustaining youth organizations
• Building and sustaining partnerships
• The importance of cross-system collaboration
Participants will participate in fun interactive ice breakers, scenario participation, and the creation of a lessons learned
white paper. The faculty team includes the perspectives of youth, youth in transition to adulthood, and families, as well
as system perspectives.
MODERATOR/PRESENTER: Tamara Johnson, Youth Program Director, University of Washington Department of
Medicine, Division of Public Behavioral Health and Justice Policy, Youth ’N Action, Seattle, WA
Lorrin Gehring, Youth Movement Alumni, Policy and Research, Youth ’N Action, University of Washington, Seattle, WA
Evey Rund, Youth Advocate, Youth ’N Action, Auburn, WA
58 Training Institutes 2012