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Policy Leadership Program on School Health Healthy Eating, Active Living Initiative | Statewide Youth Board on Obesity Prevention THE PROGRAM Engage 21 youth from around the state to advocate and promote school based health centers. The Policy Leadership Program on School Health (PLP) is a program of the California Center for Civic Participation in collaboration with the California School Health Centers Association. This program brings together 21 high school age youth from around the state to receive leadership and advocacy training. As a representative cross section of their population these youth work alongside adults to support the movement to promote the benefits of school based health centers. Currently the PLP has seven active sites (Oakland, Richmond, Sacramento, San Francisco, Santa Rosa, and 2 in Los Angeles) each with three core youth who are supported by an on-site adult coordinator. THE TRAINING The youth are convened for annual training conferences where they
participate in workshops, meet with stakeholders and experts and
develop an informed youth platform on the topic of school based
health centers. The first PLP conference, of the year, was held
from November 13-15 in Berkeley. The second training conference
will take place from April 2-4 in Sacramento. At the conference
the youth will receive training on effective advocacy strategies
that will prepare the youth for a briefing at the state capitol.
As part of their briefing the youth will present their action priorities
as derived from the community immersion activities. THE COMMUNITY IMMERSION Youth conduct questionnaires, interviews and a Roundtable Dialogue
to help them understand the needs of their community. As part of
their participation, the youth engage their community's by distributing
a handful of short questionnaires, meetings with several local stakeholders
(parents, principals, etc.) to discuss their preliminary findings,
they then develop and distribute a needs assessment that is specific
to their site, the results of which are then analyzed and a project
is selected based on the feedback that was collected. The youth
then engage their community in a forum style activity. Next the
youth attend the second PLP conference in Sacramento, after which
they will return to their communities and continue to engage their
community in bringing their project to life. Youth develop local community projects and engage local and statewide officials and administrators in implementing policy changes that will address the concerns identified by their communities. The youth use the information gathered during the community immersion activities to guide both their program and policy efforts. At the local level, youth develop a local project to help address a need identified by their community. On the policy front, the youth meet with local officials, community members, and statewide representatives to push forth the platform that they developed during the statewide trainings. THE RESULT An increase in access to healthcare; improved support for youth at their school; a statewide cadre of knowledgeable and effective youth capable of affecting policy change. The overall goal for this project is to create a statewide cadre of youth leaders that are knowledgeable and that have the power to address the health needs of their communities, from access to care to additional avenues of support for their peers at their school. From their participation the youth gain an elevated understanding of the topic, on par with adults in the field, and develop a sophisticated skill set that will help them achieve better support for their peers. |
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