Engaging Latino immigrant youth in participatory action research: Explorations of stress and resilience in a nontraditional migration city

Over six million Latino children live in poverty. Latino geographic patterns of growth have spread in the last two decades from traditional gateway cities to central portions of the U.S. Immigrants in nontraditional destination cities face a fundamentally different experience than immigrants to more established migration areas due to a lack in institutional arrangements and infrastructure designed to serve Latino populations. Using a participatory action research (PAR) approach, the purpose of this project was to collaborate with Latino immigrant youth to understand their perceptions of poverty and its relationship to stress and coping within the context of a nontraditional migration city. This project is part of an established, 4+ year academic-community partnership with an urban language immersion magnet school in Cincinnati, Ohio. Through a participatory group level assessment methodology with 78 5th-8th grade Latino immigrant youth, this project explored stressors and resilience, identifying the challenges and notable strengths of these students and their school. In this PAR method, Latino youth generated and analyzed the data and developed relevant action plans. We answered three research questions related to healthy communities, healthy bodies, and healthy minds: How do Latino immigrant youth experience poverty? What strategies do these youth use to cope? How are the stress and poverty experiences mediated by protective or support factors? Findings through collaborative group analyses with youth indicated a need for increased school and community support, safer school environments, and easier access to community resources.