Citation

Garcia AP, Minkler M, Cardenas Z, Grills C, Porter C. Health Promot. Pract. 2014; 15(1): 18-27.

Affiliation

1University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2014, Society for Public Health Education, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1524839912472904

PMID

23384969

Abstract

Growing evidence highlights the benefits to youth of involvement in community-based participatory research. Less attention has been paid, however, to the contributions youth can make to helping change health-promoting policy through such work. We describe a multi-method case study of a policy-focused community-based participatory research project in the Skid Row (Central City East) area of downtown Los Angeles, California, where a small group of homeless youth worked with adult mentors to develop and conduct a survey of 96 homeless youth and used the findings to help secure health-promoting policy change. We review the partnership's work at each stage of the policy-making process; its successes in changing policy regarding recreation, juvenile justice, and education; and the challenges encountered, especially with policy enforcement. We share lessons learned, including the importance of strong adult mentors and of policy environments conducive to sustainable, health-promoting change for marginalized youth.

Language: en