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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Recorded presentation

Kristina M. Chapman, BA, Healthy Maine Partnership of Greater Waterville, PO Box 91, 105 Kennedy Memorial Drive, Waterville, ME 04901, 207-873-0686, tinac@unitedwaymidme.org and Kristen A. Gilbert, MED, Waterville Public Schools, 1 Brooklyn Avenue, Waterville, ME 049001.

In Central Maine, there is innovate health policy and advocacy work being championed by a network of energetic community members – our local teens. The Youth 2 Youth program involves teens from four Central Maine school districts creating positive changes in their schools and communities on a variety of topical issues including school climate, bullying, nutrition, tobacco and alcohol use, and tolerance of diversity. They do so through a common denominator of behavior change theory to address their issues. In order to enhance their work, the youth teams were brought together in a forum for sharing, learning and networking at the 2006 Youth 2 Youth Summit, and as a result, they have formed the Youth 2 Youth Executive Committee for Central Maine. They have forged connections with city government and a variety of community based organizations to promote their common goals. They meet regularly to discuss successes, challenges, work plans and innovative strategies as well as gain recognition and voice as a viable collaborative youth leadership organization that represents the interests of all youth in Central Maine. Presenters will give an overview of their youth teams' work on prevention issues using behavior change theory, the Youth 2 Youth Summit, and the community-wide youth leadership team. Attendees will learn how to develop youth advocacy teams, strategies that youth teams can use to implement policy and environmental changes including behavior change theory, and how to facilitate a community-wide youth forum to create a network of youth leaders working together on public health issues.

Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the session, the participant in this session will be able to

• Describe how a youth advocacy team can create public health, policy and environmental changes in their school and community environment.
• Describe the process of creating a youth advocacy team or teams.
• Identify strategies that youth teams can use to assess and address their topical public health issue(s) including using behavior change theory and social marketng.
• Articulate how to facilitate and utilize a community-wide youth forum to create a network of youth leaders working together on public health issues.

Keywords: Advocacy, Adolescents

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Any relevant financial relationships? No

Recorded presentation