The Forum for Youth Investment is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to helping communities and the nation make sure all young people are “ready by 21” — ready for work, college and life. This goal requires that young people have the supports, opportunities and services needed to prosper and contribute where they live, learn, work, play and make a difference. The Forum provides youth and adult leaders with the information, technical assistance, training, network support and partnership opportunities needed to increase the quality and quantity of youth investment and youth involvement.
The Forum believes that all young people need and deserve intentional investments and opportunities for involvement through at least the first two decades of life. These investments must move beyond solving problems and promoting academic achievement to supporting a full range of positive outcomes — helping young people grow physically, socially, emotionally, personally, ethically, civically, vocationally and intellectually. Further, youth need more than just programs — they need a full range of basic services, formal and informal supports, and challenging opportunities. The various policies, systems, professionals and volunteers working for and with young people in the allied youth fields need support and encouragement in working together to improve the lives of the nation’s young people. The Forum uses the term “allied youth fields” to refer to the complex space where people such as child welfare advocates, service/learning researchers, after-school practitioners, prevention specialists, youth development funders and education administrators intersect.
In order to achieve our mission, the Forum is “moving ideas to impact” by building on and contributing to the big ideas coming from the various youth-related fields. The Forum produces useful products and services, provides training and technical assistance to those who work with and impact youth, and helps implement the accumulated knowledge and skills in specific locations to ensure that youth are “ready by 21.” Our programmatic work is organized around five core strategies, each building on the other:
- Research and Analysis. Creating reports that synthesize research from the allied youth fields, providing commentary on policy-relevant issues, documenting trends and strategies, framing ideas and developing tools that help organizations and communities incorporate ideas into planning and action.
- Communications and Public Information. Disseminating ideas, information and tools via existing communications vehicles, the Web and other technologies.
- Technical Assistance and Training. Providing “just-in-time” consulting to individuals, organizations and localities interested in using the Forum’s ideas, expertise and tools.
- Network Development. Creating and supporting networks of decision makers in key places, positions and systems in order to provide support and increase the flow of information, ideas and strategies across the allied youth fields.
- Implementation. Supporting management of long-term or intensive projects and initiatives that test or implement our key ideas and tools.
The Forum’s staff includes sociologists, educators, policy analysts, youth work practitioners, journalists, business professionals and communications specialists. With this diverse background, the Forum provides information and analysis on a broad variety of topics, including:
- youth policy and youth development research;
- 21st century skills development;
- out-of-school time programs and policies;
- youth service and civic engagement;
- high school education reform;
- older youth/transition to adulthood;
- youth report cards and youth budgets;
- standards development in education and youth work (defining outcomes and quality measures);
- community building and local assets development (focused on empowering those in disenfranchised neighborhoods);
- state and city youth policy agendas, children’s cabinets, and interagency task forces; and
- state and local systems integration.
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