Creating and Sustaining Positive Spaces for Youth

From time to time since I started focusing on youth development projects at IREX, I’ve thought back to my first day of ninth grade. I went to a big public high school with around 2,000 students, and I was a little lost, not really sure what to get involved in, or who my friends were going to be anymore.

I wanted to try something new, so I signed up for Yearbook, which my school offered as an elective class for credit. I still remember walking into a classroom where it seemed like everyone already shared nicknames and inside jokes, even on the first day. I was one of only two freshmen, and I was incredibly shy, and decided by the end of the period that I was never coming back.

But thanks to a great teacher who gently nudged me into participating and a senior editor-in-chief I admired, I stuck with it. I gradually took on more responsibility, became more confident, and developed a lot of skills that I still use in work and life today. (OK, so nobody crops photos by hand with an orange grease pencil anymore, but I learned a lot about communication and leadership.) By senior year, my co-editor and I were basically running the show ourselves– leading editorial meetings, setting deadlines, managing team dynamics, and taking full responsibility for the final product. It wasn’t just another extracurricular to put on my resume– it was a family, a source of self-esteem, and a place I felt I mattered.

My work at IREX centers on communities where youth don’t have many outlets to express their creativity, set their own agendas and safely test their limits like I did in high school. It goes without saying that these communities are very different from the Silicon Valley, California suburb where I grew up, and the teenagers I work with face a variety of serious challenges, including access to education, early marriage, and labor migration abroad. However, I believe it’s possible anywhere (China, Yemen, Tajikistan and Russia, to name a few) to create spaces where young people can challenge themselves, contribute to community development and have their voices heard.

Through this blog, I plan to explore how we can build and sustain these positive youth development spaces around the world.

I would love to hear your ideas, experiences, and best practices from both international and domestic perspectives.

Susie Armitage is a Program Officer at IREX