Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR)
According to UC Berkeley YPAR Hub, Youth Participatory Action Research can:
Redefine who has the expertise to produce knowledge to our world — not just professional adult researchers but young people who are living the issues they are studying.
Provide skills in inquiry, evidence, and presentation that are important to young people’s development as students and agents of positive change in schools and communities.
Generate findings that provides insights into issues faced by young people that they themselves experience, as well as the resources that matter in helping solve those issues.
Promote young people’s sociopolitical development and psychological empowerment such that they understand the roots of problems facing their communities and have the skills and motivation to take action.
Evaluate programs, policies, and practices that affect young people.
With YPAR, young people are the researchers and changemakers. YPAR is an innovative approach to positive youth and community development based in social justice principles.
Through participatory action research, young people are trained to conduct systematic research to improve their lives, their communities, and the institutions intended to serve them. YPAR builds skill development among youth in inquiry, evidence, and presentation.
YPAR can be done anywhere where youth are, including but not limited to schools, neighborhoods, and community organizations.
YPAR is an action-oriented approach that results in research findings that can illuminate the issues and solutions that are important to young people. Actions are informed by investigation that yields data to better target those actions.
This approach can be useful for any young people wanting to make a difference, and is an especially powerful approach for young people who are experiencing marginalization due to racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, classism, ableism, or other forms of oppression.
