Toolkit: Youth Engagement
A key stakeholder to addressing the dropout crisis is young people themselves. No one knows this issue as closely or with the same perspective as the students. No other member of our schools or of our community knows the daily experience of starting at home, going to school, spending the day in a classroom, spending after-school hours in the community and returning home every single day.
We offer this series of strategies and tools to help you engage young people's perspectives in the planning and execution of your dropout summit. The materials are organized in three sections: 1. Learn, 2. Listen, and 3. Lead. Each section provides descriptions and sample references and tools to engage the young people in your community. The tools in each section can be utilized independently of each other but will offer the most depth of youth perspective if used together.
Download entire handbook:
Youth Engagement Handbook (160KB PDF)
Download specific sections:
Learn (84KB PDF)
Solicit the ideas and perspectives of young people around the core issues related to the dropout crisis in their community so that their views will help inform and guide the broader conversation before, during and after the summit.
Listen (140KB PDF)
Give everyone attending the summit the opportunity to hear directly from young people about the causes and/or impacts underlying the dropout crisis in order to deepen their understanding of the issue by framing it in the personal experiences of current and former students.
Lead (96KB PDF)
Engage young people as full partners with adults in planning and executing your dropout summit.
Louisville Youth Engagement Materials (PDF)
Creating Youth Panels (PDF)
Promising Practices (Word)