From Youth Activism to Youth-Powered Curriculum

Abstract

How do youth move in an uprising? Members of YoUthROC, a BIPOC-centered, youth-led research group with young people from both the university and the community, reflect on creating a youth-powered curriculum that processes years of activism and inspires young people to use teaching as a way to create change in their communities. To ensure the relevance of their curriculum to the current needs, strengths, and curiosities of young people, the YoUthROC team wrote and collected autoethnographies, cataloged historical artifacts, analyzed social media, and conducted public focus groups and Instagram spotlight interviews during a year of uprising and unrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Results from this research include the following themes: the centrality of collectivism, internal and collective self-determination, and young people’s already-existing commitment to analysis and change. Educators, adult activists, and youth need to see that young people are central to social movements and are already contributing profoundly to anti-racist, anti-oppression work. This reflection and YoUthROC’s ongoing work is for young people eager to engage in activism, teachers looking to create authentic student-centered classrooms, and adult researchers ready to learn from and create with youth researchers.