Don’t Make Teens Go It Alone

Today, perhaps more than ever before, teenagers and their families feel as if they are going it alone in a hostile world.

In the Ojai Valley, realizing that too many of our young people are slipping through holes in society’s fabric, we have begun a bold effort to knit ourselves more closely together to support our youth. As cities throughout Ventura County are working on behalf of their young people in various ways, we hope they will find Ojai’s results applicable in their own communities.

Ojai’s effort started nearly two years ago with the Youth Master Plan, a project many cities in our county are undertaking spurred by forecasts that California’s population of teenagers is projected to rise by 25% in the next 10 years. The Ojai Valley Youth Master Plan was created in a yearlong process involving focus groups, surveys and public meetings. More than 1,000 youths and adults contributed input on our community’s strengths and weaknesses. Together we brainstormed ways the Ojai Valley can become a better place in which our children can grow up and reach their full potential.

After the resulting document was released last December, those involved breathed a short-lived sigh of relief. Short-lived because, challenging as it was to create an inspiring and solid plan, the hard part clearly lies ahead. Not only are we determined to fully achieve the plan’s objectives--which include bringing our entire community together in support of youth--we are determined to work with youth as equal partners in the effort. We feel it’s the only way we can truly succeed.

With start-up funding from the city of Ojai, Ventura County, the Ojai Unified School District and with support from the Sheriff’s Department, we have created a nonprofit Ojai Valley Youth Foundation to implement the plan. Half our board of directors are youths, paired with adults as co-chairmen of committees. Initial projects include a public education campaign for a skateboard park, youth job training and development, after-school activities at underused public sites and a student diversity summit. All involve youth as active planners, leaders and participants.

We are on untried ground, but at least we are not alone. Ojai’s approach is part of an increasingly popular movement known as “youth development.” As an Oakland initiative describes it, “Youth development takes a positive approach to young people; it calls for comprehensive approaches that regard young people not as problems to be ‘fixed’ but as assets to be nurtured, encouraged and supported by caring relationships and an abundant array of opportunities.”

Just last week our efforts received a tremendous boost with a grant from the California Wellness Foundation. Created in 1992 as a private and independent foundation, its mission is to improve the health of the people of California through proactive support of health promotion and disease prevention programs. For the next 18 months, Ojai Valley teenagers will work with adults in planning a “wellness village” to serve as a model for other communities dealing with the deteriorating state of youths’ well-being. The planning process will involve a youth-led leadership training that will graduate 500 participants, an all-youth marketing agency and planning teams combining creative and practical thinkers, both youth and adult.

Perhaps in your community, as in the Ojai Valley, kids are complaining there is “nothing to do.” The next time you hear that, think about how much there is to be done. Perhaps it’s just that no one has reached out to invite that young person to participate.