Principles 20 страница

As mentioned above, results of the youth-focused survey were presented at a formal press conference as a mechanism for external communication. The YCO also published a special newsletter detailing the results of the survey for youth. Youth leaders proved to be accomplished spokespeople at numerous public meetings and events, both large and small. While not part of the YCO’s external communicative and tactical repertoire at the time of the youth center campaign, popular theater now is a staple of the group’s

YOUTH FIRST IN JACKSON SQUARE! (¡ JOVENES PRIMERO! )

organizing approach. The central themes are improving relations between local police and neighborhood youth, and preventing sexual harassment in both school and community settings. And, of course, according to Leo, ‘‘We’re still working on getting our Youth Center. ’’

In summary, the overall change strategy employed in this campaign met the three criteria for success listed by the Innovations Center for Community

& Youth Development (2003), as discussed in chapter 4: (1) organizational leadership was able to inspire action and partnership among all members of the community; (2) they were able to develop the capacity of their organi-zation to plan, implement, and achieve its social change goal; and (3) the changes created were effectively sustained and supported over an extended period of time.

Challenges Inherent

in Youth-Led Organizing

Sustaining social justice must be a core value and strategy to promote systemic reform. We must articulate a collective progressive strat-egy that sustains a social justice legacy by promoting youth engagement, analysis, voice, and leadership. . . . Youth organizing develops a critical pipeline of thoughtful, innovative and strategic leaders who are impacting pol-icy, building institutions, transforming prac-tice, and changing culture. —Garrett, Greetings! (2006)

All forms of practice bring with them their rewards and challenges, par-ticularly those associated with social change; youth-led organizing is no exception. Some practitioners and academics would argue that a field without challenges is a field that is dead and therefore insignificant! Chal-lenges, in effect, serve to focus attention and bring solutions to practice dilemmas that can take on a variety of forms, from ethical to methodological. They, too, represent focal points at which academics, practitioners, and communities can come together to engage in dialogue and move the field forward, as is the case at hand.

The field of youth-led community organizing has its share of challenges to be met and obstacles to be overcome in order for progress to occur. For example, Williams (2003) identifies four key barriers to youth organiz-ing that present the field with incredible challenges: (1) the need to seek immediate gratification; (2) recognition that attempts at social change can result in failure; (3) the shifting priorities of youth as they grow older; and

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

(4) the adultism that can undermine youth creativity, drive, and energy. Williams’s list is an excellent starting point; however, it is far from ex-haustive. Morsillo and Prilleltensky (2005) also acknowledge the barriers to youth engagement in social action, noting that most avenues available to young people are ameliorative in nature and that social change is not always the top priority for adults.

Kim and Sherman (2006, 4) bring another challenge to the table, this one directed at society in general: ‘‘The role of youth in the emerging diverse social justice movements of the 1960s and 1970s has been widely celebrated. However, little attention was paid to intentionally developing the next gen-eration of social justice leaders. Many competing explanations have been offered, but the result was unanimous: a deep generational gap. ’’ The im-portance of recruiting, preparing, and sustaining youth leaders is beyond dispute, from our standpoint. The question becomes, How can we as a so-ciety ensure that an adequate number of youth leaders—in this case, those who are organizers—address the challenges and surmount the barriers to success, both now and in the future?

This chapter provides a comprehensive view of the considerations and challenges found in all phases of the organizing process. However, in the case of youth organizing, particular attention is paid to how age and gen-der become both facilitating and hindering factors in campaigns for social change. Some of the challenges discussed in this chapter have been dis-cussed in various ways earlier in this book; however, we believe that they are important enough to the field to be revisited.

Need for Immediate Gratification: ‘‘You Can’t

Always Get What You Want’’

Delay of gratification has been found to be a powerful indicator of self-regulatory behavior (Wulfert et al. 2002). Self-regulatory behavior, in turn, gives young people the opportunity to engage in actions that do not offer an immediate payoff, allowing them to opt for achieving more significant change and gratification at a future date. Social change never is simple, immediate, or guaranteed, as any experienced organizer can attest. Thus, young activists who enter this field with the need for immediate gain will have a difficult time as agents for social change.

According to Hanh Cao Yu, youth participants must contend with this reality:

Thus, while ‘‘events’’ and ‘‘actions’’ can be exciting, the lead up to such events involves a lot of hard work. The implication of these results is that youth involved in organizing may not feel consistently challenged and

196 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

engaged. Program staff stated that they continually remind youth of the larger purpose of organizing and try to create definable wins so that youth can connect their daily experiences with broader community im-provement goals. Additionally, organizing teaches youth patience, com-mitment and focus, and that change takes time. (Turning the Leadership 2004, 8)

YouthAction (1998) identified a series of challenges in youth organizing, one of which is how to balance achieving significant long-term social change with committing ‘‘serious’’ resources for immediate leadership and skills development? ‘‘When change does not occur as quickly as anticipated, youth run the risk of becoming bored and have a hard time embracing the ne-cessity of long-term campaigns’’ (Weiss 2003, 98). Thus, it is not unusual to see tension between those organizers focusing on long-term goals and those focusing on short-term achievements. Similar strain can be found with re-gard to differences in individual goals; some achievement of personal growth can be expected immediately, while long-term goals in this regard require the passage of time.

Failure and Success As an Integral Part

of Organizing: ‘‘Keep on Keepin’ On’’

Is success ever guaranteed in community organizing? No! This should never be the case. However, even when failure occurs, there can be much personal gain as a result. Of course, gain surely comes from success; however, young people must be able to assess both achievements and defeats, seeking to make progress in all areas that need improvement. When young people develop the ability to evaluate both their strengths and weaknesses, and learn from both, they will be more effective in future campaigns and more capable mentors, as well.

Formal evaluations of youth-led campaigns often are the preferred means to gain these insights; however, young people must be clear about what constitutes success and failure. For example, awareness of position must never be confused with objectivity (Youth in Focus 2004, iii):

Every system of evaluation is based on assumptions about what is im-portant, what is measurable and what the information is for. Make those assumptions explicit. Social scientists sometimes see assumptions as a limitation or a bias and strive for an illusion of objectivity. Good evalu-ation does not try to achieve objectivity but makes clear positionality: who is driving the process, what are their assumptions and what are their goals and where are they coming from. The illusion of objectivity can do nothing but hide the real power relationships in an evaluation process.

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

Although this analysis by Youth in Focus (2004) specifically refers to eval-uation, it also applies to the need for young people to have a clear sense of what their campaign objectives were and to what extent, if any, they were accomplished. Evaluation is usually associated with programming, but it also has applicability for better understanding the outcomes of community organizing. Rarely will a campaign result in clear success or failure. As a result, youth must be able to honestly identify strengths, weaknesses, ac-complishments, frustrations, and areas for improvement.

Growing Up and Out of a Youth Organizer Role

Aging out of youth roles and moving into the world of adults is inevitable for young people, and anyone familiar with the field of youth organizing is quick to acknowledge this point and its consequences for organizational development. Indeed, the implications are significant (Sherwood and Dres-sner 2004, 56):

Their ‘‘workforce’’ is expected to leave almost as soon as individual ‘‘workers’’ have mastered the skills needed to be good at their tasks. Consequently, not only do youth organizing groups need to have systems and methods to ensure that each young member receives the attention and support needed for his or her learning and personal development, but groups also need to have systems and methods to ensure that every young member is replaced, smoothly, so that the organizing work goes on and, ideally, so that successes build over time into a long-term vision of and progress toward fundamental change. This type of thinking, planning, and juggling is demanding.

There are other, less obvious effects of the aging-out phenomenon. First, and one that often is overlooked, is the loss of institutional memory when youth organizers leave their organizations (Weiss 2003). Their wisdom, experience, and knowledge depart with them. High turnover and transi-tions in leadership necessitate that important institutional resources be de-voted to constant recruitment and training, as has been discussed elsewhere in this book. Second, finding staff positions for new-adult organizers within and outside of the programs can be challenging, time-consuming, and stressful for all concerned. As a result, viable avenues for leadership tran-sition are important in youth-led organizations and initiatives (Young Wis-dom Project 2004, 18):

Like other nonprofits, there is often pressure on leaders of youth-led or-ganizations to be in the public limelight, especially with funders. If the or-ganization’s reputation becomes too connected with a single charismatic

198 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

young adult leader, it can undermine the leadership potential develop-ment of others in the group. Setting up clear structures to develop and transition leadership within the organization is essential.

What are useful and fulfilling roles for young activists as they move out of a youth cohort? Alumni of youth-led campaigns are excellent facilitators to ease the transition of new graduates who have just aged out (YouthAction 1998). For example, they can act as consultants, advisors, and trainers/ facilitators. This enables the graduates to tap the knowledge of alumni and, in turn, they can give back to their former group in a manner that is capacity enhancing and facilitative.

Adultism Is Alive and Well

As already noted in chapter 5, adultism is an insidious process, similar to other forms of oppression. However, unlike other types of subjugation, it is seldom acknowledged and not well recognized in society. Furthermore, it can take on many forms, all of which undermine youth decision making and leadership, rendering young people ineffective and likely to blame them-selves when failures occur. The best intentions of adults often mask the pervasive nature of this form of oppression. While intergenerational rela-tionships offer great potential for those involved, a tremendous amount of reeducation must occur on the part of adults for the potential of youth to be fully realized (Young Wisdom Project 2004).

This is not to say that adults have no role in youth-led community or-ganizing. YouthAction (1998, 25) poses the question: ‘‘How much decision-making power do you give to young people, while also finding appropriate roles that respect the experiences and wisdom of elders? ’’ This query is important and provocative, especially when considered with adultism as a backdrop. Mokwena’s (2000, 4) observations bring this matter to the forefront:

While accepting the important role played by adults, many youth activ-ists in Latin America also sounded a word of caution about the poten-tial for adult manipulation. They were also quick to criticize those adults who only used them as tokens and pawns. Some were deeply suspicious of adults in government, who often attempt to manipulate and placate them. Young community activists drove this point home from COVORPA in Oaxaca. They argued. ‘‘Youth have the power to do things for their people and for themselves. We have problems with the state but we don’t negate participation with the state, however, we cherish our au-tonomy. ’’

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

Competing Demands on Time

Youth-led community organizing, be it urban or rural based, requires that a multitude of individual goals be accomplished in addition to achieving positive change. As a result, time and timing are critical in youth-led campaigns as compared to adult-led organizing efforts. Decision making must consider the learning curve for determining how decisions are made (process), as well as the content necessary for developing an immediate, specific, and winnable campaign.

Although organizing often occupies a central place in the lives of many young activists, it still is an add-on to their busy schedules. For example, school, home chores, part-time employment, assisting younger siblings with homework, after-school activities that may include sports—all compete with organizing for youth’s time. As a result, learning how to balance competing demands for time becomes either an implicit or explicit goal for many young participants. Adults also must learn to balance multiple re-sponsibilities that vie for their attention; however, youth typically have much less control over their obligations, which very often are dictated by adults.

Importance of Getting Paid for Organizing

Many organizations and foundations that support youth-led organizing emphasize the importance of paying young activists who take on the or-ganizer/leader role. However, YouthAction (1998, 25) broadened the chal-lenge: ‘‘How do you create a lifelong passion for social justice, and simul-taneously attempt to meet the economic needs of young people who are seeking gainful summer and/or full year employment? ’’

Economic status may or may not allow children to forgo working part time. For example, YUCA’s practice of paying a weekly stipend to youth participants in the Higher Learning program highlights a critical problem faced by many organizations, especially those with a constituency that need to work to survive. Staff member Lourdes Best explains that YUCA pays its organizer/leaders because they should not have to choose between orga-nizing and getting a paying job.

Burning On, Not Out

Engagement in community organizing can be an exciting, emotionally charged, and exhilarating experience. It also can be a draining, discouraging, and disheartening one. The adrenalin rush and euphoria that accompany and

200 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

follow a successful rally, march, or direct-action protest can soon be sup-planted by a profound sense of failure, misery, and despair when the next plans go amiss and the next social-change campaign falters or fails. Righteous anger can turn inward, resulting in self-blaming explanations for defeats and the onset of depression. Both the need for immediate gratification and the inability to learn from mistakes can lead to the loss of motivation, enthusiasm, and optimism that is associated with the term burnout (Pines and Maslach 1978; Harrison 1980). However, burnout also can occur at the same time activists are successful with organizational goals for change, as they become overwhelmed by competing demands for time and financial pressures, as well as a host of other problems, including lack of recognition, feelings of isolation, difficulties getting along with colleagues, poor or no supervision, limited job promotion opportunities, inadequateorganizationalresources, crampedwork-ing conditions, too much work, and absence of a compelling organizational vision and mission (Karger 1981; Maslach 1982).

There is extensive literature on both the causes and the cures for burn-out (Cherniss 1980; Jayaratne and Chess 1984; Arches 1991), and we do not revisit this important but well-traversed terrain. However, it should be noted that youth activists, especially those with lower income backgrounds, are particularly susceptible to burnout owing to age and income, including a relative paucity of experience and maturity; the degree of difficulty at-tendant to many of the change efforts they undertake and adult-led insti-tutions they confront; the scarcity of resources in so many youth-led orga-nizing programs; financial and family stressors; marginalization, especially for youth of color; unwillingness of mainstream media to provide news coverage of positive youth actions and activities; absence of professional trainers; and disconnection from other youth-led organizing programs and larger support networks.

Since so many of these factors are deep-rooted, intractable impediments, burnout will remain a challenge in youth-led organizing for years to come. Certainly, antidotes include a broad range of personal and organizational supports, such as mentoring, strong supervision, high-quality training, a greater degree of financial stability, an atmosphere of affirmation and re-spect, linkages to similar projects, assistance from regional and national resource centers, and ongoing cultivation and advancement of a powerful organizational vision.

Can’t Get No Respect

Comedian Rodney Dangerfield never could get respect. Likewise, the media have been slow to grant youth-led organizing efforts the positive attention that they so richly deserve. Too often, young people are demonized or marginalized in the electronic and print media. Stereotypes abound, often of

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

youth as unmotivated, poorly educated, lacking a strong work ethic, alien-ated from society, abusing various substances, running in violent gangs, and engaging in criminal activities. The negative images are particularly prev-alent, offensive, and objectionable when applied to low-income youth of color. This media slant creates significant challenges for youth-led organiz-ing efforts, especially those in multicultural urban areas with high poverty rates.

Positive media coverage can be a powerful weapon when community organizations pressure their targeted institutional decision makers to meet demands for social change. Third-party audiences—often the general public, made aware of the change initiative through media coverage—may help determine whether organizational goals are achieved. Likewise, positive or negative publicity impacts the ability of those decision makers to maintain or gain power and advance their careers. An organization’s ability to bless or blast its targets, with media coverage, is an important source of power (Staples 2004a).

Positive publicity gives a group greater credibility, both internally ‘‘on the street’’ and externally with important people and institutions that have not been targeted. When community organizations are in the news, there’s almost always a boost in recruitment. Beyond the community, good press coverage can win over potential allies, gain the respect of elected and ap-pointed officials, attract volunteers from other groups, catch the attention of the general public, and enhance the organization’s reputation as a serious player. Clippings of positive and prominent press coverage often go a long way toward establishing the group’s legitimacy and viability in the eyes of possible funding sources.

When the media fail to cover an organization’s protests, the group has lost important leverage, and unfortunately, this too often is the case for youth-led organizing initiatives. Mainstream media outlets tend to dismiss social-change campaigns led by young activists; therefore, securing more and better media coverage is a high priority for some youth-led organiza-tions. Many groups put additional energy and time into cultivating good media relations; skills to work effectively with the media now are frequen-tly incorporated into leadership development training programs for young activists. Old patterns of thinking and stereotypes often die hard, but when concerted efforts are made to develop and nurture relationships with the relevant media, there is reason for guarded optimism.

Adult Organizers in Waiting?

On the surface, it seems normal to view youth organizing positions as logical stepping stones toward an adult organizer role. However, this view can have inherent challenges and contradictions. HoSang notes:

202 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

A natural temptation exists to assess youth organizing efforts from this same vantage point—a ‘‘not quite’’ dry run in anticipation of a more bona fide effort to build ‘‘real’’ power as adults. Youth organizing projects are then either uncritically valorized and boosted without serious engage-ment, or all together dismissed as marginal and non-strategic. Adults may feel that youth members add ‘‘spirit’’ and ‘‘vitality’’ to actions and meet-ings, but do not expect them do to the heavy lifting of lobbying, advocacy, and turn-out crucial to sustaining social change projects. (Funders’ Col-laboration on Youth Organizing 2003, 17)

Evaluating Youth-Led Community Organizing:

‘‘Can’t Live with it, and Can’t Live without it’’

The role of research and evaluation in the youth-led field is undeniable (Delgado 2006; Fernandez 2002; Fletcher 2004; Youth in Focus 2004). Fun-ders increasingly have sought to demonstrate the effectiveness of these initiatives (Innovative Center for Community and Youth Development 2003); however, evaluation has also provided a venue for youth-involvement and leadership, regardless of the setting.

Schools are a prime example of the potential role students can play as evaluators (Fletcher 2004, 22):

By involving students as evaluators, schools can develop purposeful, impacting, and authentic assessments of classes, schools, teachers, and enact accountability and ownership for all participants in the learning process. Effective evaluations may include student evaluations of classes and schools; student evaluations of teachers; student evaluations of self; and student-led parent-teacher conferences, where students present their learning as partners with teachers and parents, instead of as passive re-cipients of teaching done ‘‘to’’ them.

Nevertheless, a word of caution is in order. For instance, the popularity of youth development no doubt will continue, influencing youth-led com-munity organizing both in this country and internationally (Fernandez 2002). Research and evaluation in the youth development field can be ex-pected to cross into youth-led organizing. Soon, these organizing initiatives will need to prepare for the arrival of social scientists and evaluators, who will be eager to document the processes and outcomes in their campaigns for social change. This phenomenon, in all likelihood, will not be well re-ceived by the youth-led organizing field.

New models of research and evaluation must be developed to take into account the unique aspects of this organizing approach (Delgado 2006). However, evaluation is a method heavily grounded in politics (Youth in Focus 2004, ii):

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

Everything is political and the drive towards evaluation is one of the most political movements in the current funding world. It is a two sided coin— when done for the right reasons, with the needed resources and support, evaluation becomes what it should be: a way for groups to take the time to reflect on their work to get feedback from participants, partners and the external environment and to find ways of becoming more effective. . . . At the same time, evaluation can serve as a dodge for the discomfort that some funders may have with supporting social justice and social change work.

Involving the young people doing the organizing in evaluating their own work will reduce some of this resistance. They can be instrumental in all facets of research and evaluation, thus generating support for more scien-tific investigations and ultimately strengthening the organizing at the same time as young activists develop new skill sets. The principles that govern youth-led community organizing are well served by similar guidelines for youth-led research. The integration of these two movements is a natural occurrence and in the long-run will benefit both fields.

It is imperative that the field avoid falling into long-established traps regarding what constitutes important questions in an evaluation effort. ‘‘In a society in which social policy is privatized and youth are mere commodities, the information all sides seek and relentlessly exploit is not the most im-portant (no matter how accurate and topical), but the most salable (no matter how distorted, even ridiculous)’’ (Males 2004, 11). This caution should be heeded; evaluation is not value free and, as a result, is subject to sociopolitical forces and considerations.

No form of youth-led initiative or setting has escaped increased scrutiny (Delgado 2006). As a result, youth-led community organizing has had to contend with the challenges of evaluation. YouthAction (1998, 26) cautions: ‘‘Dispel the liberalism so often present when talking about youth, and youth organizing. Raise the level of expectations and seriousness about youth or-ganizing efforts. Hold youth organizing to similar evaluation standards as other types of organizing. ’’ However, the fact that there should be rigorous criteria for evaluating youth-led community organizing does not mean that they are identical to the principles and methods applied to other youth-focused endeavors. Rather, the nature of the organizing process must be taken into account in determining the research questions, procedures, and conclusions. In short, a cookie-cutter approach is simply unacceptable (Delgado 2006).

As already noted, youth development and youth-led community orga-nizing are not antithetical. Operating from a community context promotes the integration and achievement of both individual and social-change goals. Bridging the worlds of individual and community allows youth-led projects to set ambitious goals that can be tailored to complement community social-change goals. This flexibility, a hallmark of any good youth develop-ment project, facilitates the crafting of projects that take into account local

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