This story is part of a series of success stories focused on restorative justice work. The work featured in these stories seeks to acknowledge the impact of harmful practices and creates opportunities to heal that harm between those who enacted it and those impacted by it to transform the community. Birdseed Collective is an arts-based 501(c)(3)…

This article describes a community collaborative project, "I've got yer back," that utilized the craft of needle felting to raise awareness and develop understanding of the anatomy of the human spine. The project took place in 2023 and engaged with participants from across the United Kingdom and abroad and its completion was timed to…

The mental health and well-being of rural communities in the United States is a growing and serious concern. Generally, suicide rates are higher and increase more rapidly in rural areas than in urban areas (Ringgenberg et al., 2017; Steelesmith et al., 2019). Studies suggest that isolation, limited socioeconomic opportunity, and sparse access to…

Climate change is a critical crisis of our time and a difficult challenge for museums to address in their respective communities. The Wild Center's Youth Climate Program offers an example of how one museum is working with high school students as partners to advance climate change action in schools and communities to build climate resilience.…

Juvenile delinquency intervention and treatment programs have the broad goals of preventing crime and reducing recidivism by providing treatment and services to youth who have committed crimes. The following five statements are presented in this report and based on practices and programs rated by CrimeSolutions: (1) Juvenile awareness programs may…

What do people need to learn to engage actively in social action for neighbourhood improvement or development? How important is emergent learning relative to planned learning in this context? Where does first-person knowledge fit into the body of knowledge required for success in bringing about change for the better in neighbourhoods through…

Objectives: Drug education is delivered by a broad spectrum of multi-disciplinary practitioners within the fields of health promotion, drug prevention and treatment, social care, and community and youth work. However, drug education is often misunderstood or conflated with drug information and/or drug prevention. This ambiguity of understanding is…

Founded in 2011, the Bay Area Science Festival (BASF), led by the Science and Health Education Partnership (SEP) at UC San Francisco, brings together academic, scientific, corporate and civic groups to develop and lead STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) events for all ages. From 2011-2019, the Festival hosted over 50 events…

Although research shows early intensive behavioral intervention is efficacious when delivered in university or private intervention centers, little is known about effectiveness or feasibility of disseminating early intensive behavioral intervention to larger communities. The Michigan State University Early Learning Institute was developed to…

Four organizations were brought together by a common desire to create a unique community service program that focused on increasing the language and literacy skills of children born to teenage parents. This article explains the process of creating this project from conception through workshop design, implementation, and outcomes.

This article describes the needs analysis, implementation and outcomes of a pilot program aimed at creating books with families in ways that represent their language and culture. "Creating Books in Communities" is part of "Better Beginnings," a state-wide program, developed by the State Library of Western Australia, for…

In this article I reflect on my experiences as a previously incarcerated individual being involved in theatre performance for the first time. I reflect on how my involvement in arts and education programmes in prison made me aware of the larger structures of Whiteness that were embedded in the educational and arts contexts that I found myself in…

Theoretically, increasing family resilience, may contribute to an increase the resilience of communities. However families in South Africa experience challenges to their resilience, often owing to a variety of historic, socio-economic, and political factors. Research and intervention planning that attempts to ameliorate the effects these factors,…

During a sabbatical semester in Fall 2018, "Community Literacy Journal (CLJ)" co-editor Paul Feigenbaum volunteered as a "Scholar-in-Residence" at Youth Enrichment Services (YES), a nonprofit established in 1994 that is based in the East Liberty neighborhood of Pittsburgh. Guided by its mission "to create hope out of…

The Youth Transitions Partnership (YTP) in Alameda County, California blends service coordination, intensive case management, and Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) to help transition-age youth in foster care engage with available support systems and subsequently improve their outcomes. As part of a formative evaluation of YTP, Chapin Hall…