Focus Package: Reaching Urban Youth

With this resource, Health COMpass provides access to health communication tools and project materials that focus on reaching urban youth. According to the United Nations, "the world is undergoing the largest wave of urban growth in history." Health COMpass reflects that this may provide young people with better access to learning, health care, jobs, and even a global perspective, but also put them at risk when economically poor families need to find work for their daily costs: rent, food, etc. Some will turn to informal sector work, including crime and transactional sex, which in turn will have a negative impact on their health. The materials presented here emphasise "social and behaviour change communication (SBCC) (which) has been identified as a successful strategy for reaching youth on sexual and reproductive health (SRH) issues" although urban youth face challenges such as "social marginalisation, a mobile populations, informal settlements, and violence and crime."

A sampling of the tools and project examples that can be adapted to use with urban youth follows, organised by the steps in the SBCC process (analysis, design, development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation, and increased audience participation):

Tools -

• Theories and Approaches [for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention] - This website provides definitions and rationales behind common theories (i.e., social cognitive theory, stages of change theory) and approaches (i.e., male involvement, service learning, youth development) used in developing adolescent pregnancy prevention programmes. Also included are descriptions of real programmes using specific theories and approaches as well as practical steps for incorporating different theories and approaches into programmes.
• Does Your Organization Have the DNA Required to Start a Youth Leadership Development Program - This is a checklist to complete before considering embarking on a youth leadership development programme. "You can use this self-assessment checklist to determine whether your organization is ready - in terms of its organizational culture - to launch a youth leadership development program."
• Youth Outcome Toolkit - The National Research Center, Inc. (Colorado, United States) created the Youth Outcome Toolkit as an evaluation resource for programmes serving youth. The toolkit contains a menu of youth survey questions encompassing nine broad outcome areas: Academic Success; Arts and Culture, Community Involvement, Core Values, Cultural Responsiveness, Healthy Lifestyles, Life Skills, Positive Life Choices, and Sense of Self, as well as questions related to programme quality. The toolkit contains multiple versions of youth outcome survey templates to accommodate Spanish-speaking youth, high and low literacy youth, and various stakeholder groups (parents, staff, and teachers). The toolkit also provides surveys for two different study designs ("post-only" or "pre-post") and step-by-step directions for designing an outcome evaluation.
• Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health Toolkit for Humanitarian Settings - See "Related Summaries" below.
• Building Emergency Contraception Awareness for Adolescents: A Toolkit - The sections of this toolkit are designed to help users increase knowledge of emergency contraception (EC) and stay up to date. They provide suggestions for increasing EC awareness in the workplace, whether it is a school district, a school, a school-based or school-linked health centre, or a community-based organisation. The toolbox contains tools to build EC awareness, including sample letters, articles, forms, protocols, and instruments.
• Youth Leadership Development Toolkit - This toolkit provides information to help urban youth workers get oriented to the topic of youth leadership development, offers examples of leadership curricula, and includes forms that can be used in programme evaluation. It includes links to project development tools, project implementation tools, and project evaluation tools. Each of the items in the toolkit is also available separately in the Health COMpass.
• Community Pathways to Improved Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health - This pathways model and set of indicators was developed by the Inter-Agency Working Group (IAWG) to more explicitly articulate the multiple roles that communities can play in addressing adolescent sexual and reproductive health issues. See "Related Summaries" below.
• Engaging Youth Development & Participation toward Successful Outcomes - This resource explains and is based on the Positive Youth Development (PYD) approach to reaching youth. PYD is an active process which enables youth to reach their full potential by providing them with opportunities and experiences to be leaders and gain skills. A PYD approach recognises that young people are resources to develop and engage in their own personal transformation.

Projects - Examples exist for various levels of intervention: national, community, and individual. Here is one example of a project at the national level:

• Sugar Mommy/Sugar Daddy TV Spots - "These TV spots are part of the Safe Love campaign, a comprehensive HIV prevention campaign that addresses key drivers of HIV/AIDS in Zambia, including multiple and concurrent sexual partnerships, low and unconfident condom use, and mother-to-child transmission of HIV." The spots show young girls and boys approaching older men and women, presumably exchanging sex for money or favours.

Community-level examples include guides for peer educators, lesson plans, and training manuals. For individuals, apps for smart phones, comic books, and other written resources are available.