A Youth Development Strategy: Principles to Practice in Re-creation for the 21st Century

Reco Bembry

Note: A version of this paper appeared in the Journal of Park and Recreation Administration, 1998, 17(2), 15-34.

Executive Summary: This article provides elements of a community-based approach to youth development. The plan contains strong support for linkages between principle centered leadership among staff and participants to create positive values transference and development through recreation programming. The goal of the plan is to enhance the mental and physical well-being of youth and communities. The paper explores and develops strategies to accomplish two related but quite different goals: (a) develop programs which can reduce youth risk factors such as drug abuse, teen pregnancy, violence and illiteracy, while (b) simultaneously providing activities that build the character, values, self-esteem and employability of youth. A number of studies of adolescents, public health, recreation and education point to comprehensive approaches as a means of fostering youth participation and development (Carnegie, 1995). The focus of this work is to generate support and resources for the implementation of a comprehensive youth risk-reduction and development strategy that utilizes recreation facilities as centers for youth and for the community. The issues facing teens today are much greater than those facing youth in the past. By working to reduce harmful risks, meet physical, mental and emotional needs, and build competencies, we can truly reclaim, rebuild and restore essential bonds between youth and community development. The paper presents programs, activities and methods that have worked in Seattle with low- to high-risk youth. Major themes include: an introduction to a Re-creation Strategy, which redefines the role of recreation as a fulcrum for linking youth and community development; and an exploration of best practices and principles of youth work. Five basic principles underlying youth work are introduced: trust, respect, integrity, consistency, and self-esteem. Recurring themes and qualities that make up a successful youth worker are also described. This is the first of two papers that will be published by the author. The second paper will appear later this year and deal with development of the Seattle Teen Life Center.

Keywords: youth development, re-creation, prevention, intervention, maintenance.

Author: Reco Bembry is Coordinator of Teen Programs, Citywide Division, Seattle, WA Department of Parks and Recreation, 100 Dexter Avenue, North, Seattle, WA 98109. E-mail: reco.bembry@ci.seattle.wa.us. This paper is an edited version of a paper undertaken while Reco was on leave in 1996 to participate in the year-long Community Fellows Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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"Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgment. Life’s most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?" —Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Introduction

History teaches us that one era is connected to another, and that the unfolding of the future is not random but is in fact a reaction to the past. The current and future dilemma facing youth in our society is clearly a reflection of the way we have treated our youth in the past. In the coming era, the parks and recreation field must evolve a new social vision which is based on an understanding of how and why our world is changing (Godbey, 1997). If the 1980s were about self indulgence and actualization, the 1990s and beyond will be more about community and the sustained ability to develop human potential.

With the many community risk factors and challenges facing today's youth, service providers (e.g., recreation departments, local law enforcement, schools, businesses and public health organizations) are challenged to improve the delivery of services, participation, and involvement by teenage clients. There seems to be an ever present danger to the contiguous development of youth from adolescence to adulthood and the stability of neighborhoods. Many researchers and practitioners support the fact that risk factor reduction alone does not support growth and development of adolescent teens or communities. Teen populations 10-19 years old receive an insufficient amount of family and community support, funding, and attention which interrupts their connectedness to community.

In the following pages, I will provide some elements of a comprehensive community-based youth development strategic plan. The plan contains strong support for linkages between principle centered leadership development among staff and participants to create positive values transference and development through recreation programming. The goal of the plan is to enhance the mental and physical well-being of youth and communities. I will support research that suggests youth participation and involvement are key components in youth and community development. I will also articulate substantive stages of development which link youth and community development using recreation as the center of participation, organizing, and institution building.

Recreation is a means to an end that builds better human beings and creates community wellness; therefore, it is incumbent upon us to be involved in the forefront of our communities as coalition and consensus builders capable of facilitating partnerships between businesses, schools, law enforcement, human services, families, and youth to insure that we are preparing them to become more productive, contributing citizens in the 21st century.

The sustainability of neighborhoods are contingent upon the ability to involve youth in community development, while simultaneously reducing risk factors that affect their well-being. Through her regular column in Youth Today, Karen Pittman provides comprehensive strategies that offer a full range of services, opportunities and supports through a well-functioning network of individual, community and institutional providers that must be present if the goal is youth development.

Programs and institutions can not contribute to development, but they can not control it; informal settings are critical to creating connectedness between youth and community development. We will need to encourage involvement, participation and the equitable distribution of teen resources to support proactive sustainable youth development models that serve a multiplicity of youth from different socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds. This approach will promote community networking opportunities for recreation supervisors, managers, and directors, as well as leading to enhanced networking partnerships with corporations, community groups, and service providers. This collaborative implementation strategy will enhance the development options for youth as opposed to the development of reactionary "band-aid" program models which suffer from competition for decreased foundation and governmental funding resources.

Technological advances are moving faster than society’s ability to keep up with them. As a result of modernization of industry, there is a new ability to produce products for consumers with about one fourth of the work force needed twenty years ago. This trend towards information technology will result in a vast increase in displaced, unemployed or low-skilled workers. The majority of these unemployed workers will be poor and primarily from minority communities. Without meaningful work or even a prospect for career changes, many human beings will struggle with the question of what to do with their lives. At the same time, youth and adults alike will have more and more discretionary time on their hands. We can deal with some of these issues by providing quality recreation programs designed to reduce risk while simultaneously offering youth community-building skills, mentoring, entrepreneurship, and leadership development. This increased value of public recreation during discretionary and leisure time relies heavily on our ability to redefine our mission, remain flexible yet focused, connected to community, and conscious of societal trends leading us into the 21st century.

By identifying the most effective ways to involve youth in recreation and parks programs, we will hopefully encourage their participation in community building as well. Youth should be viewed as current assets as opposed to training them simply for some contribution far into the future.

These issues will be discussed, challenged, debated and reviewed in this document with the hope that the discussion may spark continued legislative action and support to improve comprehensive neighborhood-based youth service delivery. Utilizing recreation programs, activities and systems as fulcrums for change in communities, we hope to facilitate continued collaboration, involvement, and development of youth and communities.

Background

As a result of the neglect and continued abuse of our youth during adolescence, we have continued to erode basic support systems that lead to the development of youth and communities. How do we overcome the errors of the past and build supportive communities of the future? In this section, I start with an overview of the slow erosion of our youth development infrastructure that has led to some of the current challenges and conditions.

As a result of youth rebellion and involvement in the 1960s through civil disobedience towards the lack of civil rights and against the Vietnam war, unrest in urban centers increased dramatically as did funding and program opportunities offered in park and recreation systems nationwide. Parks in urban centers and college campuses became the meeting places and locations of civil unrest. In theory, increased funding to park departments to create programming for rebellious youth (built upon the work of early settlement houses), served as an attempt to provide alternative activities for youth at-risk of participating in anti-governmental activities such as demonstrations, sit-ins, etc.

In the early 1970s, park and recreation departments in Seattle had recreation leaders at every community center. These staff worked directly with teens, specifically those who were at-risk of becoming involved in unfavorable activities. In the 1970s, recreation activities were heavily attended by youth at any one of a number of community centers and parks around the city. There were sports leagues, culture clubs, theater, drama, homework assistance, and social activities, all with adult supervision and interaction.

Recreation professionals spent quality time with youth in after-school programs and on weekends as coaches of sports teams, dance instructors, mentors and tutors. Community center staff evolved into the role of surrogate parents as both biological parents were increasingly forced to work in order to keep up with the mortgage and insure the financial viability of their families.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, there was a sharp increase in the divorce rate of American families; this led to the creation of many single parent homes and an increased amount of unsupervised and unstructured time for youth specifically in urban communities where fewer non-fee based youth oriented recreation and leisure services available.

In the 1980s, due to a changing economy and political focus, park and recreation systems experienced deep budget cuts that resulted in termination of most leaders at community centers who specialized in working with teens. School districts also suffered cuts in program staff and elective activities (e.g., music, drama, sports) as a result of traditional family migrations to the suburbs, increased privatization, forced bussing, and low academic achievement in public school systems.

As a result of these extreme federal, state, and city budget cuts, there was a reduction in general recreation staffing at community centers, pay cuts and title reductions. These reductions forced a number of recreation professionals (supervisors) and entry-level recreation attendants to become generalists. These community leaders, who had served as surrogates to impart life skills and values transference to youth, were no longer available as a community resource for parents and guardians. The responsibilities of these generalists changed to monitoring buildings, answering phones, supervising and coordinating fee-based leagues, facility rentals, senior activities, and pre-school and early adolescent programs. These trends were difficult to counteract. While seniors and working parents represent the most consistently active voting population in our society, most teens have no voting power or adult support in the legislative process to advocate for their need to develop normally as adolescents.

Recreation staff without the time or updated training to deal with the increased number of youth at-risk in their communities had to, in essence, perform social triage by locking out high maintenance teens. Most of those teens were crying out for someone to provide them with valuable life skills, mentorship, coaching and support...all of which had been available to youth in the previous decade.

While there was a decrease in specialized staff at community centers, there was also a reduction in low-tech industrial jobs in metropolitan areas. Simultaneously urban centers in America experienced the introduction of massive trafficking in cocaine and other illicit drugs in neighborhoods generally, but primarily in low income communities of color. This led to an increase in organized gang activities, which led to violence and a negative recruitment of many youth between the ages of 10 and 19.

These youth were encouraged to join gangs and other forms of organized crime, prostitution and other rebellious activities in an attempt to belong, be loved and be respected. This infusion of negative influences affected the sustainability of youth involvement in positive community activities, and produced a communal disharmony specifically among young men of color. These were the same young men who would have been the star athletes on the sports team, the debate club champions, or the jazz band soloists in inner city schools.

Partially due to the lack of available surrogates in communities, access to higher education, and positive value-based life experiences, drug abuse, gang activity and teen parenting grew in prevalence and led to a host of other negative factors such as violence and urban decay. The lack of regenerative surrogates continued the deterioration of the urban centers and decreased the resilience of communities to defend themselves against attack.

Conditions in the 1990's

As detailed by the Carnegie Report, Great Transitions: Preparing Adolescents for a New Century (1995), we are already seeing results of a lack of attention being paid to early adolescent youth and teens growing up at the turn of the information age. According to this report, current conditions for young adolescents between the ages of 10 and 14 are looking very grim. The statistics speak for themselves: America is neglecting it's youth at younger ages than ever before.

"In 1993, approximately 7.3 percent (19 million) of the U.S. population were young adolescents, ages 10 through 14. Of these, approximately 20 percent were living below the federal poverty line, which in 1993 was $14,763 for a family of four." (Carnegie, 1995)

Health Risks

* The homicide rate for ten through fourteen year old more than doubled between 1985 and 1992.

* In 1992 twelve to fifteen-year-olds had a high overall victimization rate, they were the victims of assault more than any other age group.

* Two thirds of eighth graders report that they have already tried alcohol; one quarter say that they are current drinkers. Twenty-eight percent of eighth graders say they have been drunk at least once. They perceive little risk in smoking cigarettes and using drugs.

*Marijuana use among eighth graders more than doubled between 1991 and 1994.

* In 1988, 27% of girls and 33% of boys had intercourse by their fifteenth birthday.

* Pregnancy rates for girls younger than fifteen years old rose by 4.1 percent — higher than any other teenage group.

* By age fourteen to fifteen, girls are twice as likely as boys to suffer from depression, a gender difference that persist into adulthood.

* From 1980 to 1992, the rate of suicide among young adolescents increased 120 percent and increased most dramatically among young black males (300%) and young white females (233%). Suicide rates for ten to fourteen year olds of all races increased.

Educational Risks

* The average proficiency in science, mathematics, and writing among eighth graders was slightly higher in 1992 than it was in the 70's. However, these performances have not improved enough to keep pace with the higher level of skill required in a global economy.

* In 1992 only 28% of eighth graders attained the proficient level in reading, representing solid academic performance at grade level. Two percent read at or above the advanced level, representing superior performance. The remaining 70% demonstrated partial mastery of the knowledge and skills required for proficient work in the eighth grade.

* In 1990, 7% of the eighth-grade class of 1988 (most of whom were fifteen and sixteen years old) were dropouts. By their senior year (1992), 12% of this class were dropouts.

As we approach the 21st century, youth are faced with increasing challenges; they are sandwiched between the industrial and information technology age, are being raised by the first generation of adults that know less about the advancing technology than youth, and also the first generation of adults to be more afraid of youth than youth are afraid of adults. We need to be prepared to provide warm, loving, developmental environments for youth who will eventually be charged with the responsibility of running the world. Many communities have started working on isolated risk behaviors and aspects of social policy, but what is needed is a comprehensive approach that takes advantage of networking between agencies and focuses on youth and community development, as opposed to just reducing risk. We have worked in Seattle to develop such a model. This model has served to reduce risk factors, but has fallen a bit short on some essential aspects of youth development principles. However, the model has proven to be effective in building inter-departmental networks (figure 1).

Existing Seattle Program Efforts

Utilizing the efforts of the Seattle Team for Youth (STFY), many successful programs, spanning a variety of areas, have been developed. These include our Late Night Recreation Program developed in 1989 by the Seattle Department of Parks and Recreation. The Late Night Program is an intervention program model developed to intervene and decrease negative behavior exhibited by teens and young adults ages 13 through 22 years old. The increase in negative behavior of this age group often influenced risk among younger and younger adolescents. This situation creates unsafe conditions for youth in many neighborhoods. The Late Night program was modeled, in part, after the Midnight Basketball program in Prince George's County, Maryland, but was enhanced to provide more than basketball as the primary magnet activity. This

Figure 1. Seattle Team for Youth's Identification and Case Management Model

innovative approach increased our ability to serve a more diverse population of teens with various interests. Seattle's Late Night Recreation program has successfully served thousands of teens on weekend nights and assisted with up to a 30% reduction in violent crimes and negative behavior exhibited by teens in troubled neighborhoods.

The success of the Late Night Recreation program as an intervention tool led to additional resources being generated for the Department of Parks and Recreation to develop many other teen programs, such as the Together for Teens (TFT). This program, developed as a UPARR demonstration project, currently serves a focused, but not exclusive, community of new immigrant and refugee populations. The goal is to prevent teens from becoming involved in unfavorable, illegal and negative behaviors and activities. TFT provides increased resources during the summer in neighborhoods with high numbers of new immigrant, Asian and Pacific Islander populations. This successful program spawned a youth entrepreneurship project called Yo’ Hot Shots, which works with local businesses to supply training and products for youth to learn how to start and run their own businesses. Fifty teens are currently being trained as baristas through our corporate partnership with Tully's coffee. We hope to expand this program to serve many other teens who express an interest in and need for employment and training. Due to the success of the TFT program, it has been suggested by recreation professionals that this programming approach be duplicated during the school year to support youth in after-school activities.

The after-school program model was designed, embellished and developed by the Ackerly Foundation and the Department of Parks and Recreation to provide resources for ten staff persons at ten recreation facilities in addition to dollars for five vans to be shared between them. These vans serve a dual purpose: (a) transportation for youth to get to and from activities safely, and (b) an opportunity for the Ackerly’s to promote their professional basketball team, the Seattle Super Sonics. The Project Hangtime program is funded almost exclusively by the Ackerly Communications group to maintain the level of surrogate community leadership at community centers. The coordinated programming approach has also included a summer camp created to give teens an opportunity to come together from different neighborhoods for an overnight camping experience, many holiday events and activities such as dances, theatrical performances, trips to cultural institutions, and sporting events.

Where are We Now

The issues facing teens today are much greater than those facing youth in the past. Thus there needs to be a comprehensive risk reduction and youth development strategy implemented to meet youth where they are in communities. By working to reduce harmful risks, meet physical, mental and emotional needs, and build competencies, we can truly reclaim, rebuild and restore essential bonds between youth and community development. In the next section we will present programs, activities and methods that work with low- to high-risk youth. Major themes include: an introduction to a Re-creation Strategy, which redefines the role of recreation as a fulcrum for linking youth and community development; and exploring best practices and principles of youth work.

Defining a Re-creation Perspective for the 21st Century

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, a series of social reform movements and organized leisure time activities became connected. From efforts undertaken at places such as the Hull House in Chicago, which bred a collaboration between charitable organizations and the settlement house movement, evolved the profession of social work through the work of Jane Addams (Lindblad, 1995). In addition, recreation field work from the Boston Sand Gardens sparked organized movements around the country which emerged into the Playground Association of America.

Many settlement houses were created across the country where social service work and recreation activities worked together to improve the quality of life for citizens. As a result of this enhanced leadership in both the social service and recreation and leisure service industries, there emerged a different view of program purpose, direction and clientele. Over time, social work agencies worked primarily with poor and disadvantaged citizens, while public recreation and leisure services moved to attract and cater to more of the working class and affluent private sector. This is evident in the creation of world-class golf courses, Olympic-size aquatic facilities, and the increase in publicly sponsored fitness centers. To sustain these world-class facilities, public parks and recreation leadership started to solicit and program for citizens who could afford to pay for these "public services and facilities," and thus, in many cases, abandoned the increasing number of disadvantaged inner-city youth.

This neglect became most evident in the late 1950s and early 1960s with the emergence of the baby boomers into teenage life. There seems to be striking parallels between the civil unrest of the 1960s and the neglect of youth and teens by recreation and parks systems. In the 1960s as a result of the Vietnam war, the Civil Rights movement and the organization of poor and disenfranchised, community parks systems re-emerged as program and activity providers for the disenfranchised to offset, as noted earlier, gatherings, rallies and other civil disobedience which generally occurred in public spaces such as parks and recreation facilities. The government provided millions of dollars to recreation and parks systems nationwide to provide services, programs and activities to youth and citizens in the inner city, in part due to pressure applied by the working class and affluent populations fearing for their safety and deterioration of the community. As we move into the 21st century, youth issues, and risk and dangers during discretionary and leisure time have become an increased focus of many large recreation and leisure service systems. Demographics of inner-city urban areas have rapidly changed and yielded a more diverse and higher risk youth program participant. As a result of this shift, many recreation professionals lack the skills, training or commitment to provide programs for primarily inner city youth. Many recreation professionals have found themselves in neighborhoods they do not know, serving a population of children and youth they do not understand. As a result, there have been many dangerous confrontations, a lack of attractive programming and growing apathy at community centers and other recreation facilities.

In 1995, the American Academy of Park and Recreation Administration; the National Recreation and Park Association; the Department of Recreation, Park and Tourism Sciences at Texas A&M University; and Fort Worth's Park and Community Services Department sponsored a National Colloquium on recreation services for at-risk youth (Witt & Crompton, 1996). This colloquium invited youth workers, administrators, and program developers from around the country to share state-of-the-art programs that appeared to be successfully working with youth. At the colloquium there were exchanges of valuable program ideas and information, and the sessions helped to spark a re-emergence of social consciousness in the recreation profession as it relates to youth and risk issues. These new recreation warriors are involved in what I have coined re-creation: a movement of young vibrant leaders and older more experienced recreation professionals, committed to saving the lives of our troubled youth.

Re-creation Development Strategy

Re-creation builds on the themes introduced in settlement houses by Jane Addams in the late 1800s and other efforts of the early recreation professionals who saw the power of the positive developmental use of discretionary and leisure time for the development of youth. Building upon these themes, re-creation is based on the delivery of sports, education and cultural experiences to youth at a multiplicity of risk levels through maintenance, prevention and intervention based programming. Combining the best practices of social work and recreation, the re-creation philosophy is based on the foundation of supporting youth in the development of individual values and principles such as trust, respect, integrity, consistency and self-esteem (TRICS) to increase core competencies and connectedness of individuals and communities, and to more adequately support youth and families. These principles and competencies will be discussed in greater detail in the following sections.

For many years adults have pre-determined what the best strategies are to address youth needs without hearing from youth themselves. As I have progressed, considering myself a youth advocate, I believed I knew what was best for youth. After listening to youth in a variety of settings, I was quickly reminded that I have no youth voice and cannot adequately represent all of what works for youth unless I ask them and bring their voices forward to represent their own views. The following section outlines "what works with youth" from the perspective of youth and youth workers who actually work in the field. We must remember that youth are a very important part of a community’s ability to sustain its development, but there is a valuable role that adults play in the development of youth as well. I have found that each should be valued in developing a combined voice. Whether the voices be dissonant or harmonious, they are both important to create the sounds of creating a vibrant community.

Risk Reduction

The following strategy is one which works to reduce risk among youth and communities, while simultaneously developing the resiliency, competency and life skills of youth who live with a host of environmental risks and behaviors. There are different levels of risks associated with each of the risk factors and behaviors. The levels of risk require responses that address the problems at each level. The re-creation strategy divides youth risk into three basic categories (low-risk, at-risk and high-risk), and develops activity and program responses to all three (maintenance, prevention and intervention).

Maintenance programming addresses youth with a normal level of risk. In the last 20 years, prevention-based strategies have been developed in response to a greater than normal amount of at-risk behaviors primarily among inner-city youth. Intervention programs promote strategies other than incarceration as methods to reduce harmful activity among high-risk groups.

When programming for at-risk youth, fundamental needs must be addressed first. Most programs overlook these basic needs of youth such as building protective factors through programming, safety, and consistent availability. In addition, no clear guidelines and directives are provided for recreation services. If, through our programs, youth were taught to balance their own personal needs, values, and principles and to be aligned with the development of community, they would not look to gangs and other types of negative surrogates as substitutes for families.

Hawkins and Catalano (1994) have done extensive research on risk focused prevention and state "to prevent a problem from happening we need to identify the factors that increase the risk of the problem developing and then find ways to reduce the risk while enhancing protective or resiliency factors." They have identified four basic environmental factors that affect healthy youth and young adult development: communities, families, individual/peers, and schools. In their 1994 report, Communities that Care, they identified substance abuse, delinquency, teen pregnancy, school drop-out and violence as the leading adolescent problem behaviors which affect youth and community development. If we reduce or counter the risks in young people’s lives, problems associated with those risks will be greatly decreased. Hawkins and Catalano also explain how protective factors work together to buffer children from risk so they can develop into healthy adults.

The re-creation strategy suggests that we must have systems in place to identify risk factors and problem behaviors before we can truly begin to address needs, and build resiliency and competencies in youth. This strategy also builds on the modern day social work practice called "backdoor therapy," which employs the concept of meeting youth where they are. Thus, mental health professionals working in non-traditional settings attempt to identify the mental heath needs of youth and provide ongoing therapy as a part of normal recreational activities. This method allows social workers to collaborate with recreation professionals to "support the developmental needs of youth outside the traditional clinical/client/patient environment" (Dejesus, 1996). Most mental health models are built on the medical model of deficit orientation. Backdoor therapy has been effective by utilizing the small pool of men in the social work profession to work with larger groups of youth in group settings and on recreational excursions.

Once the risk factors and problem behaviors are identified and addressed, the re-creation strategy suggests we develop appropriate activities and programs that can address the needs of youth while simultaneously building competencies (Figure 2). Addressing risk factors is only a part of the comprehensive solution to youth detachment from families and communities. It is also important to build the resiliency, capacity, competency and character of youth, with the end product being youth development (Figure 3).

Figure 2. Developmental Steps based on Fundamental Principles of Re-creation Strategy

 Figure 3. Youth Development Perspectives

Building Blocks to Successful Teen Program Development

Vision Statement

All successful service models begin with a vision statement which outlines the direction in which a community wants to grow. In developing a vision statement, communities should consider the resources that are currently available to them from small businesses, facilities, industry, transportation systems, local and national advertisers interested in youth populations and others who have a vested interest in the success and development of the community. However, the most important resource available in any community is its people. Through people, social capital--which is the strongest wealth you can gather--may be developed. It is through people that funders are contacted, volunteer and professional work gets completed and new legislation gets passed.

Once a team of concerned citizens are focused on a consortium to develop a re-creation strategy, it is important to determine a combined vision and direction for what you want youth to do and where you want youth to be now and in the future. Figure 4 gives a sample vision statement developed for Seattle’s Teen Program Unit. Remember, visions of the future can change, as the demographics, needs and competencies of the neighborhood change.

Figure 4: Vision Statement

By providing high quality services to teens through our maintenance, prevention and intervention program models we will attract teens towards positive programs and away from negative risk activities and behavior.

By building trust, respect, self-esteem, integrity and consistency we will provide culture, sports and educational activities which serve to attract teens from a multiplicity of risks enhancing the quality of life for all youth in communities.

By involving each participant with his or her own gifts, challenges, values, and circumstances we create the potential for them to participate in youth service delivery, youth organizing and institution building with a goal of youth and community development.

Neighborhoods change, youth change and circumstances change, so remain

flexible but focused in accomplishing youth and community development.

Re-creation programming can serve to provide opportunities for individuals, families and communities to come together to work on issues that adversely affect their environments. Recreation departments nationwide have provided programs and activities to reach youth for many years. Too often these programs are offered without a connection to the developmental needs of youth. The following program levels are targeted to meet youth where they are and addresses corresponding risk levels:

Intervention –> High-Risk;

Prevention –> At-Risk;

Maintenance –> Low-Risk,

all through Sports/Athletics, Culture/Diversity and Education/Lifelong Learning. These programs and activities provide appropriate entry points for reaching and teaching youth by building resiliency and competencies among youth in re-creation settings.

Programs

Intervention programs target a population of high-risk youth (Gansters) who have been involved in illegal and unfavorable behavior and are in need of intensive and immediate attention to "stop" these life threatening behaviors. The mission of Prevention programs is to target a population of at-risk youth (Wanna Bees) who may be associating with higher risk taking youth or starting to become involved in higher risk taking behaviors. Maintenance programs target youth (Latch Key Kids) experiencing a normal amount of risk associated with youth development. It is important to create an array of programs for this group of youth who represent the highest percentage of risk per capita in most communities, but who, in recent decades, and have also received the smallest amount of resources, attention and care. Most youth start here and then digress into higher risk levels.

Activities

Activities are the calling card for most youth to participate in recreation programming. Thus, activities must be fun, exciting, have built-in systems of recognition and, in most cases, participatory. Some individual activities also can be useful, but are generally designed to address individual and not community focused needs. The main activities used in our programs include:

(a) Sports: We must actively engage our youth in meaningful experiences, including athletics, which serve to widen their life experiences through supervised, calculated risk.

(b) Culture: We must include activities that contain the ideas, customs, skills, arts, etc. of given people in a given period or civilization. By the year 2000, more than one third of all young adolescents will be racial or ethnic minorities. To compete in the global economy of the 21st century, America will need all of its young people to be healthy and well educated. Culture also implies a number of subsets by which youth are categorized (e.g., gangs, teen parents, ethnicity, gender, age) and other social structures which serve to mold the views, references and interest of youth, e.g., activities that serve to enhance a young persons ability to relate to themselves and to others in society. Examples of cultural activities include: dances, poetry, visiting and interacting with museums, ethnic cooking, beadmaking, and sharing about one’s culture.

(c) Education: These activities include giving instruction or information, and the process of training and developing knowledge, mind, and character. Dropout rates vary by students' race/ethnicity (e.g., Anglo, 9.4%; Black, 14.5%; Hispanic, 18.3%; Asian/Pacific Islander, 7.0%; and American Indian, 25.4%). The economic consequences are profound. High school dropouts are unlikely to earn sufficient wages to support themselves or their families (Carnegie Council on Adolescent Development, 1995). Education activities hold the keys to success: lifelong learning and empowerment. Through building skills and knowledge of essential developmental tools, youth are given the freedom to accomplish beyond that of previous generations, often times breaking the cycle of poverty and illiteracy. Our role in recreation should be to support youth in applying what they should learn in school into a community context, through access to information technology, study groups, reading clubs, life skills (e.g., basic heath, vocational and entrepreneurial skills, job training, and leadership development). Examples of the interrelationship of education and other program objectives include: how math increases the ability to problem solve and how problem solving relates to the ability to resolve conflicts; how through reading and demonstration a person can increase their knowledge and skills about an area of interest; and how communicating in writing and learning a foreign language increases a youth’s ability to function in a multicultural society.

Principles

As noted previously, there are five key principles that underlie all youth work: trust, respect, integrity, consistency, and self-respect. Each of these is outlined below.

Trust is the assured reliance on the character ability, strength, or truth of someone or something. Trust implies: one in which confidence is placed; dependence on something future or contingent on (hope); to commit or place in one’s care or keeping (Websters, 1995). Trust is the glue that holds everything together. It creates an environment in which all other elements and systems can flourish. Trust is the natural outgrowth of trustworthiness. At the heart of empowerment is trustworthiness which is a function of character and competence. Character is what we are, competence is what we do and both are necessary to create trustworthiness (Covey, et. al., 1994). Throughout history, trust has been the key to lasting relationships, quality business partnerships, and serves as the cornerstone of communication. Without trust our ability to reach youth becomes much more difficult, if not impossible.

Respect includes considering another as worthy of high regard; to refrain from interfering with (one's privacy); the quality or state of being esteemed; an act of giving particular attention. Respect is a two way street: you respect youth and they will respect you. Youth and adults should be respected as individuals, not in groups, but "one on one". Self-respect internalizes the assurance that one is living up to personal standards and self-expectations to the best of one’s ability. It also implies displaying an appreciation for the personal space and taste of others without regard for fashion, status or ability, but with regard to the fact that we share human qualities and are all capable of making mistakes.Youth violence generally occurs when the spirit is violated. When asked why a hardened youth committed a violent act against another person, the youth responded "because he disrespected me." Youth hold respect in very high regard, one-on-one, and even more specifically when interfacing with peers.

Integrity involves adherence to a code of moral, artistic or other values; the quality or state of being complete or undivided. Integrity is not optional, it is essential; you are who you are no matter where you are. He/she has nothing to prove or hide except their integrity. Integrity produces the sustained cultivation of character; the continued relief of a clear conscience; and the priceless inheritance of a lingering legacy. Integrity is the "I" in the tricks-of-the-trade and has consistently remained one of the most challenging principles for youth workers to adhere to. Integrity is the one thing every human being is judged by regardless of creed, color or religious background. Integrity is the word whose meaning can never be as powerful as it’s action.

Consistency is the condition of adhering to; degree of firmness, density or character; agreement or harmony of parts or features to one another or a whole. Consistency gives structure which takes time to build. It should be our goal to offer daily routine from which consistency grows. When teaching good behavior, parents, youth workers, mentors and volunteers should "practice what they preach." Children learn values and beliefs more by examples adults set than by verbal instruction. Thus, "what you do speaks so loudly, I can’t hear a word you’re saying". Consistency among staff, parents and community persons is important to show harmony and clarity in beliefs and standards for youth. The importance of a rule is learned by consistently having it enforced. Consistency is the routine that sets in motion your habits, norms beliefs and practices and which ultimately determines how others see you and you see yourself.

Self-Esteem includes self-respect, self-conceit, self-efficacy, self-worth, self-image. The foundations of self-esteem are established in the early stages of a child’s development. Self-esteem is the way we relate to ourselves, to others and to life. "It affects the way we learn, work and build relationships. It is what we believe about ourselves: ‘if we believe we can, we do!’, if we believe we can't, we don't even try!" (Friedman & Brooks, 1995). Self esteem leads to confidence and skill building; by performing a skill correctly, it gives a sense of power and control to positively affect one's esteem or self-image. The feeling of knowing how and receiving praise has a profound affect on the human condition. Self-esteem is a psychological construct which refers to how the self (body and mind) is viewed. Genetics, physical characteristics and innate skills and talents will influence self-esteem. If you have high self-esteem, you have an ability to make good friends, you care about yourself and others, you are responsible, you enjoy learning, you are proud of what you do, you can handle failure, you can share your feelings (Friedman & Brooks, 1995).

Staff Development: What makes a great youth worker?

Staff (youth workers) must develop an increased amount of competence and character to work with youth participants. We cannot expect participants to grow without giving our staff the tools, training and environment to encourage their own growth and then transferring the tools of this growth to the participant. Recreation workers I have had contact with sometimes use the phrase "values transference," which means the staff person or mentor at some point transfers the life skills that work for them into the hands and mind of the mentee or participants, and then monitors the use and growth of the individual from that point forward into adulthood. At this point of growth, community centers and staff play a critical role in the development of youth. Youth spend a great deal of their time during after school hours and on weekends in the care of recreation attendants and leaders, whose values, skills and behaviors are being transferred to youth. Tracey Lithcutt, of Boston Community Centers and Director of the Streetworkers program, states that newly hired employees should not be allowed to work with youth until they go through a process of development themselves to insure that they have the right stuff to "move youth forward."

Growth and development happens through establishing principles and tools which youth workers can use to enhance their own lives and the lives of youth in the community. Many staff, when offered training to improve their skills in working with youth, tend not to take advantage because they generally need skills which will teach them how to deal with the crisis in their own lives first.

The re-creation strategy offers tools that work to enhance the development of staff and participants simultaneously. In addition to the practical and intellectual notion of character and competence is the necessity to gain an understanding of youth culture as it relates to ethnicity, developmental norms, gender biases and geographic origins. These supports are essential to secure a team of staff who are competent in the evolution of recreation programming techniques and practices in addition to having a geographic and cultural understanding of the neighborhood and targeted populations.

Often in this re-emerging recreational system, there are staff who are trained in traditional recreation delivery methods who supervise others who are, in most cases, very familiar with the needs and sensitivities of the community, but have very little or no formal recreation background or training. This often causes stress and strain on the line staff - supervisor relationship, when they both need each other to be successful. Staff and supervisors alike should follow the essential building blocks of successful relationship-building through the development of exercises and practices which serve to enhance trust, respect, integrity, consistency and self esteem, while simultaneously building competencies regarding youth popular culture, current successful youth work practices, and the development of character through healthy beliefs, and clear and consistent standards.

After conducting interviews with youth workers, youth, and volunteers around the country reading several journals, periodicals and drawing upon my own reflective practices in youth work and management, the following are some of similar recurring themes and qualities that I have found to make up a great youth worker.

"Beyond the Paycheck"

(a) Ability to gain a functional understanding of neighborhood history, demographics, key families, and successful traditions and cultural customs that make the targeted community unique.

(b) Ability to build relationships with key neighborhood and community leaders such as: families, churches, small business owners, formal and informal youth groups.

(c) A passion and empathy for youth and youth issues.

(d) Ability to gain respect and trust of the "shot callers". In every neighborhood there are peer groups of youth and youth leaders who set the informal direction and tone for large numbers of youth. These "shot callers" should be enrolled as peer advisors to work towards youth development, not community destruction.

(e) Ongoing training and working knowledge of conflict resolution styles and self defense.

Character includes integrity and maturity. Integrity is the ability to "walk your talk" publicly and privately around a balanced set of principles. Maturity implies a balance of courage and consideration that enables you to say what needs to be said, give honest feedback, address issues in a straight forward manner, but with consideration and respect for the feelings, thoughts and opinions of others, i.e., staff, supervisors and participants.

"The Right Stuff"

a) Enthusiasm, leadership, motivation, and a genuine caring for the program and participants are essential. Wrong reasons are personal gain and publicity.

b) Ability to relate to teen issues, dedication, consistency, follow through, support, lifting self esteem, ability to work in the trenches, know the area, be in contact with the community, and ability to relate to males and females.

c) Consistency, ability to breakdown barriers, love for the kids, recreation skills, adapt to change, multifaceted parenting skills, strength and steadiness, the all purpose player.

d) Doing it for the right reason, transferring personal experiences, personal development.

A Concluding Thought

Youth who take initiative and organize themselves should expect adult resistance in response to their initiatives (Checkoway, 1994). Since youth grow up in communities and not programs, it is important to remember to utilize organizing principles to provide sports, cultural, and educational opportunities for individuals, families and communities. It is equally important to remember the five basic principles of success in developing youth relationships: trust, respect,

integrity, consistency and self-esteem. A comprehensive approach to youth development involves issues of personal, community, and youth development.

References

Lindblad, K. S. (1995). Jane Addams and social reform: A role model for the 90s. Journal of National Association of Social Work, 40(5), 661-69.

Catalano, R. F. & Hawkins, J. D. (1992). Communities that Care. San Francisco: Josey-Bass Publishers.

Carnegie Foundation. (1995). America's young adolescents face serious risks. Chicago, Il: Carnegie Foundation.

Carnegie Council on Adolescent Development. (1995). Great transitions: Preparing adolescents for a new century. Waldorf, MD: Carnegie Corporation of New York.

Checkoway, B. (1994). Involving young people in neighborhood development. Academy of Educational Development.

Covey, S. R., Merrill, A. R., & Merrill, R. R. (1994). First things first. New York: Simon and Shuster.

Dejesus, T. (1996). Interviews and conversations.

Friedman, M. S. (1995) Parenting for self-esteem. Internet Webpage.

Friedman, B., & Brooks, C. (editors). (1995). OnBase. Kansas City, MO: Base Systems Publishers.

Godbey, G. (1997). Parks and recreation in the 21st century. State College, PA: Venture Publishing.

King, M.H. (1981). Chain of change. Boston: South End Press.

Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary. (1993). Springfield, MA: G. & C. Merriam, Co.

Witt, P. A., & Crompton, J. L. (1996). Recreation programs that work for at-risk youth: The challenge of shaping the future. State College, PA: Venture Publishing.