Youth Programs

HRiA is widely recognized for its youth development programs, which foster the vitality and engagement of young people as community leaders. Our approach recognizes the potential of young people to invest in their communities, catalyze change, and bring enthusiastic problem-solving to bear on local challenges. Many of our programs have become national models for leadership development.

The BEST Initiative
The BEST Initiative (Building Exemplary Systems for Training) is a national training program for youth work professionals. BEST's' certificate programs are grounded in the youth development approach. Topics include youth worker certification, supervision, mental health, gender specific development and general youth work.

The 84
The 84 is a statewide, youth tobacco prevention movement funded by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. Through this program, HRiA distributes youth mini-grants that promote local activism and policy change, coordinates statewide gatherings and contests, provides trainings, and manages an interactive web site specifically for young people, The 84. The site actively engages the 84% of youth in Massachusetts who do not use tobacco and aims to continue raising that threshold.

Peer Leadership Training
Peer leaders are young people who commit to promoting healthy behavior in their communities, particularly among other young people. HRiA's programs engage young people in the learning process and encourage self-discovery within the context of their own personal experience and communities. After completing peer leadership training, young people educate their peers about health and prevention issues through a wide range of creative and effective strategies.

HRiA's peer leadership training manuals help groups and organizations develop and sustain peer leadership training programs.

Each manual provides:

• Dynamic, interactive learning activities
• Step-by-step lesson plans that can be adapted for a variety of groups
• Ready-to-use guides, worksheets, teaching tools, and resources
• Outreach activities for peer leaders

HRiA offers three Peer Leadership Training Manuals (download order form):

• Peer Leadership Preventing Tobacco
• Peer Leadership Preventing AIDS
• Peer Leadership Preventing Violence

HRiA also provides training to prepare organizations for effective youth work. Trainings are designed for youth workers, prevention specialists, community organizers, educators, and youth:

• Young people as resources for prevention
• Action planning with young people
• Teaching youth how to be advocates
• Recruiting peer leaders
• Understanding adolescent development issues
• Youth/adult collaboration