Record Details:

Center for Teen Empowerment

	Latitude:	42.339808
	Longitude:	-71.076205

Main/General Business Number: 617.536.4266
Website: http://www.teenempowerment.org/


Mission: from the website:

ABOUT TEEN EMPOWERMENT

The mission of the Center for Teen Empowerment is to empower youth and adults as agents of individual, institutional, and social change.

Teen Empowerment (TE) inspires young people, and the adults who work with them, to think deeply about the most difficult social problems in their communities, and gives them the tools they need to work with others in creating significant positive change. At TE's youth organizing sites, youth and adult staff bring authentic youth voice into the dialogue about improving their communities, mobilize the energy of urban youth to create meaningful change, and facilitate mutually respectful relationships between youth and adults. The Teen Empowerment Model is responsible for our success. TE's interactive methodology is effective with groups of all ages, and TE staff train others to use the model and have written a book, Moving Beyond Icebreakers©, describing our creative approach to group facilitation.

Contact Name:various people, see below




This organization provides Temporary or Permanent Service? Temporary

Notes:

This group also works with the Warren Gardens "Higher Ground" neighborhood improvement program: http://www.citizencommandcenter.org/shelters/show/8987

CONTACT INFO for Teen Empowerment:

ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICE
The Center for Teen Empowerment, Inc.
48 Rutland Street
Boston, MA 02118
Phone: 617-536-4266 x 312
Fax: 617-536-4311
mlewis @ teenempowerment . org

DORCHESTER SITE:
Teen Empowerment Program
21 Balfour Street
Dorchester, MA 02125
617-427-1488 or 617-427-1599
kit@teenempowerment.org

EGLESTON SQUARE SITE:
Teen Empowerment Program
2010 Columbus Avenue
Roxbury, MA 02119
Phone: 617-442-4684
Fax: 617-442-4687
jen @ teenempowerment . org

WARREN GARDENS SITE:
Teen Empowerment Program
130 Warren Street
Roxbury, MA 02119
617-652-8014
craig @ teenempowerment . org

ROCHESTER SITE:
Teen Empowerment Program
392 Genesee Street
Rochester, New York 14611
Phone: 585-697-3464
Fax: 585-413-1951
doug @ teenempowerment . org

SOMERVILLE SITE:
Teen Empowerment Program
165 Broadway
Somerville, MA 02145
Phone: 617-625-6600 ext. 2256
marlon @ teenempowerment . org

from the website:

THE TEEN EMPOWERMENT MODEL

The Teen Empowerment Model, upon which the Center for Teen Empowerment's programming is based, is a comprehensive methodology for working with groups that has wide-ranging applications in both youth and adult settings. It is made up of a clearly articulated set of beliefs that are actualized through a system of group building, skill development, decision making, and behavior management methods.

A. Beliefs
The first four in this set of beliefs have particular ramifications for youth program structure and approach, while the final two apply more broadly to both youth and adults in terms of how education and training are provided and how these constituencies work and relate together in groups.
There is a connection between feeling powerless and increased risk of engaging in dysfunctional behaviors.

* When youth, particularly those at greatest risk, do not have access to legitimate sources of power, they are more likely to be attracted to negative behaviors as a means of acquiring power.
* While most youth do not have input into decisions about how schools and communities function, they often have easy access to negative forms of power, such as dealing drugs or using weapons.
* Providing varied opportunities for a broader range of youth to access legitimate forms of power reduces the need among young people to pursue destructive forms of power.

Analysis + Decision-making + Action + Success = Power
Teen Empowerment provides youth with the tools they need to analyze the issues in their communities and schools, to identify those issues they consider to be most important, and to make decisions concerning the best ways to address these issues. Adults then provide the necessary support to ensure that these efforts are as successful as possible. While people can and do learn from their failures, the TE Model is based on the belief that people of all ages usually learn more from success than from failure and are more likely to be inspired by success to continue traveling down a positive path.

Youth have the ability to make real and meaningful changes in their schools and communities.
The work done at Teen Empowerment is not merely an exercise that is good only for the youth involved. Teen Empowerment youth organizers are engaged in real work with the expectation that their efforts will result in the achievement of powerful and positive changes in their schools and communities.

To make real change, youth need access to adequate resources to implement their ideas.
Teen Empowerment actualizes this belief by paying young people to work as youth organizers, and providing them with the resources they need to implement their organizing strategies. Every TE site has access to the financial resources needed to carry out their chosen community and school change strategies.

The most effective forms of youth and adult leadership are facilitative rather than command in nature.
The role of a Teen Empowerment leader is to facilitate a process by which the group identifies the best solutions to the problems it faces and makes decisions about the actions that need to be taken.

In both youth and adult group settings, there is a connection between the skillful use of interactive group work methods and the ability of the group to reach consensus and to maximize the amount of productive work they are able to accomplish.
Interactive methods used skillfully can help to form deep relationships among group members and to build a trusting environment where people are willing to take chances and experiment with new forms of creative problem solving. Furthermore, these methods can build real consensus in a group by bringing out voices, thoughts, and feelings that might otherwise remain hidden. This genuine consensus provides a significantly more powerful basis for action because the chosen actions are more fully supported by all group members.

B. Methods
This section first gives an overview of Teen Empowerment's interactive methodology and its centrality to all of TE's work. It then describes the procedures by which the TE Model carries out its youth organizing mission: selecting and training the youth organizer group, working with the group to plan and implement social-change initiatives, and creating and maintaining a highly productive group by managing behavior and practicing effective communication skills.

1. The Innovative Use of Interactive Modes of Learning and Work
One of the important factors enabling TE's success is the Teen Empowerment Model's unique approach to group facilitation, which emphasizes interactive modes of work and communication as a means of significantly increasing productivity. This reliance on interactive methods is based on the belief that groups function optimally when everyone's voice is heard and when group members are given the tools they need to develop relationships based on trust. In this kind of caring and safe environment, people of all ages become willing to take chances and experiment with new forms of creative problem solving. Furthermore, the use of interactive methods brings out thoughts, feelings, experiences, and skills that would otherwise remain hidden, thus creating a much broader basis for reaching a consensus to take action and for maintaining the motivation to ensure that the chosen actions are successfully implemented.

Teen Empowerment uses these interactive methodologies in every aspect of our work with both youth and adults. We have found that the thoughtful application of these methods helps groups to effectively achieve their goals -- from goals as simple as learning names to more sophisticated goals such as resolving dysfunctional classroom dynamics or developing innovative curricula that enable populations with special needs or learning challenges to succeed. Furthermore, TE uses interactive techniques to continuously reinforce the vital link between the group's mission and its current work, thereby increasing the group's investment in its work and in the ultimate success of its organizing efforts. Thorough integration of these methods into all aspects of our work allows TE to engage the hearts, minds, and energies of diverse groups of students, teachers, and other youth and adults in finding solutions to difficult problems.

2. The Participant Selection Process
The initial phase of the Youth Organizing project at each site is the Participant Selection Process, which is used to select young people who will work as a youth organizer group. The selection process includes an extensive recruitment of applicants; a first interview consisting of a two hour interactive group session and a ten minute individual interview; and a second interview, using the same methods as the first, conducted with about one third of the initial applicants.

Following the second round of interviews, staff considers each of the applicants. At each site, TE seeks to hire a group that is gender-balanced, reflects as closely as possible the diversity of the school or community where the group will work, and includes those who are considered to be at-risk. Through this process, staff identifies youth who are connected to all of the various subgroups of the targeted school or community and are willing and able to exert a positive influence over those subgroups.

3. Initial Training Modules
During the first week of the project, youth organizers complete a detailed curriculum designed to:

* Build group and individual relationships.
* Identify key issues in the community or school where the project is based.
* Place identified issues within a larger social context.
* Develop 2-3 strategic action steps to begin addressing the identified issues.
* Begin implementation of the first strategic initiative using TE's 10 Step Planning Process.
* Orient group members to Teen Empowerment's Behavior Change System.

4. Ongoing Training and Planning Sessions
After the initial training period, youth organizers continue to meet for interactive work sessions four or five days per week. The first session each week is used to address group issues and implement the Behavior Change System (see below). Each of the other sessions uses the TE meeting format, as follows:

* Introduction, covering the purpose of the day, the timeline of upcoming initiatives and projects, and a review of the day's agenda.
* Warm-Up Question, which poses a question to be answered by each member of the group. Facilitators select the question to highlight some aspect of the group's work, to educate the group regarding a societal or community change dynamic, or to work with a particular group dynamic.
* Springboard Exercise, which consists of a physical or intellectual group challenge that is designed to generate and focus group energy, to highlight a societal, community, and/or group dynamic, and to connect group members to the purpose of their work together.
* Work Section, consisting of decision-making and educational activities that take place in the whole group, and of small group work (such as planning logistics, producing graphic materials, and writing and practicing speeches, skits, or raps) needed to carry out the chosen organizing strategies. When participants work in small groups, the groups report back on what they accomplished and in some cases demonstrate what they have produced and get feedback from the group.
* Summation, in which the facilitator speaks briefly about what has been accomplished and what is coming up for the group, makes announcements, and addresses any logistical issues such as assignments or handouts to be distributed.
* Evaluation, in which group members rate and comment on the day's work.

5. Implementation of Social Change Initiatives
Every year at each Teen Empowerment site, youth organizers plan and implement numerous initiatives designed to achieve their goals for positive change. Read about recent initiatives at our sites here.

6. The Behavior Change System
TE's Behavior Change System is used to manage behavior and to develop appropriate work, learning, and communication skills within the context both of TE Youth Organizing groups and of the larger community. The system also has broad application and has been used in a variety of projects that seek to employ participants in a group work setting while addressing communication and behavioral issues. The system used by TE's Youth Organizing projects includes:

* Weekly Feedback: In this element, participants learn how to give and receive both criticism and praise and to view feedback as a set of skills that can be improved through practice and reflection. Feedback aims to connect positive emotions with both positive and negative information about each group member. In the weekly session, facilitators first lead the group through exercises designed to surface group issues. They then provide training in feedback skills. Finally, the facilitators open the feedback session; facilitators give feedback to group members, and group members give feedback to one another and to the facilitators.
* Youth Organizer Work Contract: The Youth Organizer Work Contract details exactly what is expected of each group member and the precise consequences for failing to meet the expectations. Expectations are clearly outlined and cover some 25 behavioral categories, including motivation and attitude within the group and behavior within the classroom or the community. Here is an example of how the contract works: The first time a participant is late for group, he/she is warned; the second time, the participant loses two hours pay; the third and fourth times, he/she loses three hours pay; and the fifth time, the participant is fired. Participants can earn back an assessed fine if they work for a specified amount of time without incurring that infraction. If a participant is fired, he or she may, at the discretion of the staff, reapply in writing and, after volunteering in the program for a week with no contract infractions, be rehired.
* Intensive Feedback: Once a year, each TE site participates in a daylong Intensive Feedback session that takes place on a school holiday or a weekend. In the morning of the session, an outside facilitator conducts interactive exercises designed to surface group issues. The afternoon consists of further training in feedback skills, time to prepare feedback, and about three hours of giving and receiving feedback, using one of several formats. Intensive Feedback sessions are life-changing in nature and result in significant individual growth, resolution of group tensions, and noticeable gains in the group's ability to work productively for the improvement of their school or community.

C. Operational Structures
Teen Empowerment programming is implemented through a common-sense operational structure that consists of three components:

* Youth organizing. TE has sites in Boston, MA, Somerville, MA, and Rochester, NY. At each site, youth are hired and trained to identify critically important issues and to design and implement effective actions to address these issues. In addition, youth in each city come together to work on citywide initiatives, most notably the annual Youth Peace Conferences.
* Consulting and training. TE trains teachers, school administrators, police officers and other adults working in human service organizations in the use of our unique and effective methodology.
* Dissemination of instructional materials. Teen Empowerment is developing a series of publications and videos that will make TE's methodology accessible to a national audience. The first of these is Moving Beyond Icebreakers©: An Innovative Approach to Group Facilitation, Learning, and Action.

D. Conclusion

The Teen Empowerment Model is a comprehensive system for bringing people together into working groups that function effectively to reach their goals for creating positive change. TE is committed to continuously refining the model and to learning through practice and reflection how best to fulfill our organizational mission. In addition, we are immersed in ongoing efforts to disseminate what we have learned and to broaden the scope of the model to serve other populations that could benefit from this work. Through this process, Teen Empowerment is building an ever more sophisticated system for increasingly productive, meaningful, and significant institutional development.

See materials for these topics at this link:
http://www.teenempowerment.org/model.html

Model Contents:

* A. Beliefs
* B. Methods
* 1. The Innovative Use of Interactive Modes of Learning and Work
* 2. The Participant Selection Process
* 3. Initial Training Modules
* 4. Ongoing Training and Planning Sessions
o Introduction
o Warm-Up Question
o Springboard Exercise
o Work Section
o Summation
o Evaluation
* 5. Implementation of Social Change Initiatives
* 6. The Behavior Change System
o Weekly Feedback
o Youth Organizer Work Contract
o Intensive Feedback
* C. Operational Structures
o Youth Organizing
o Consulting and Training
o Dissemination of instructional materials

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