Trauma-Informed Youth Engagement™ Series

Service Description

Trauma-Informed Youth Engagement™ Intended Audiences (Supportive Adults): Youth Coordinators, Family Advocates, Youth/Young Adult Advocates, Peer Specialists, Program Supervisors, and Staff who prepare Y/YA for advocacy and care planning. Highly popular with youth workers, clinicians, & adult allies who want to add new tools and approaches to enhance the engagement of and connections with youth and young adults to help them reach their goals. Having youth voice represented in organizations and at events is one of the important ingredients for changing the way that systems respond to the needs and desires of the children, youth, young adults and families. Many organizations experience difficulty not only recruiting young people to be advocates but also in moving from tokenism to authentic youth participation. It is critical for Supportive Adults (SAs) to be trauma-informed, given the effects that trauma can have on Youth/Young Adult Advocates when sharing their story in a public setting. Trauma-Informed Youth Engagement™ training results in better engagement and higher levels of youth/young adult participation. You will leave the training with new tools, new perspectives and strategies to minimize the negative impact of re-experiencing trauma. This training will teach you to create the necessary conditions to improve self-efficacy of Y/YAs to continue to grow personally and professionally, whether they are advocating for themselves or systems change. This series of 6 2-hr virtual workshops will teach participants how to apply trauma-informed principles to become the best the possible adult ally, while breathing renewed passion to working with youth/young adults. The series will focus on:  Determining the most appropriate level of effective youth participation  Identifying and mitigating unintended consequences of involving youth  Minimizing the chance of re-traumatization  Addressing social learning developmental needs  Emulating transformational relationships qualities  Practicing and role playing new skills to real life youth-involved scenarios  Creating new activities for authentic cultural connectiveness  Optimizing youth voice through a benefits/risks analysis