What is Giving Compass?
We connect donors to learning resources and ways to support community-led solutions. Learn more about us.
Giving Compass' Take:
• Here is a detailed report of evaluations on Opportunity Youth Forum, a collective network that aims to engage young people in systems change work to build equity in communities.
• How can this research inform donors on what successful equity strategies look like in youth development?
• Learn why collaboration is crucial for creating systemic change for young people.
Independent evaluators Equal Measure conducted an evaluation to explore the status of the Opportunity Youth Forum and the communities in which they operate to better understand areas of strength and opportunities for additional focus and learning. This report details Network-wide evaluation findings drawn from data collection among 23 of 27 communities participating in the Forum for Community Solutions’ OYF Network in 2019.
Equity, youth-led change, and community power are core values and strategies embedded in the OYF work. Collaboratives are incorporating these values into their infrastructure and processes, as well as into their efforts to change local systems. Every collaborative is explicitly acknowledging racial equity and community disparities in its planning. In addition to incorporating racial equity as a critical factor in setting the opportunity youth agenda, collaboratives are building diverse partnerships reflective of the communities they serve and making strides to diversify their decision-making ranks.
Read the full report about opportunity youth and systems change at the Aspen Institute.
The OYF Network serves as a collective of communities working towards systems change to better re-engage and support opportunity youth. A look at how systems change in 2019 varied across different types of collaboratives suggests that larger collaboratives and those with more staff dedicated to opportunity youth efforts — as well as collaboratives and backbones that have focused on opportunity youth for a longer period of time — are more likely to report greater systems change.