Positive Youth Development

Our Positive Youth Development (PYD) training is a holistic, strengths-based workshop that empowers staff to prepare youth for a positive transition to adulthood.

This training is built by the community and for the community, centered on fostering stronger staff-to-youth interactions through social-emotional learning, emotional intelligence, and trauma-informed care.

History

In 2012, LAYC developed its own PYD curriculum and began training staff of all levels both within the organization and externally. This curriculum focuses on serving youth of color and is designed to encourage collaboration across departments, strengthen teams, and build a cohesive and comprehensive model of youth development.

PYD Training Breakdown

Positive Youth Development (PYD) is a strength-based approach that:

  1. Places value on young people regardless of their situation and;

  2. Emphasizes fully preparing young people to succeed and contribute to their futures now, rather than focusing on risky behaviors.

  • The full course is 48 hours long, spread across 6 days.

    We also offer an abbreviated version of 24 hours across 3 days.

    In both cases, each day of the workshop is 8 hours long, including a 1 -hour lunch.

  • The 6-day course is broken down into the following modues:

    Module 1: What is PYD?
    Module 2: What Impacts Youth Development: Brain, Trauma, and Resilience
    Module 3: Race, Equity and Allyship
    Module 4: Communication
    Module 5: Healthy Relationships and Youth Goals

    For the 3-day curriculum, or other special scenarios, the training curriculum can be adjusted to provide more or less time and depth of instruction based on each organization’s needs and capacity.

  • An ideal group size is 15-24 participants, aided by 2-3 facilitators. Groups of 18 or more may require 3 facilitators.

  • LAYC comes to you and provides on-site training.

  • LAYC encourages you to consider the full course to cover the complexities of this topic, but we do offer a 1-day “PYD Essentials” training that serves as an introduction to the topic.

Why should your colleagues take the PYD Training?

  • The training provides value and insight on how we can treat youth outside of [work] because we all surrounded by young people and they all deserve the respect and confidence we are trying to bestow on the participants we serve.

    Nov. ‘23 Participant

  • Everyone should participate in PYD to solidify the strength of our individual experiences with the power of a common understanding of what positive youth development means.

    Nov. ‘23 Participant

  • [The training provides]a moment to pause from our daily duties and reflect on our internal challenges. It also adds to continuing to work on a positive work culture and the opportunity to speak openly about issues we face.

    Nov. ‘23 Participant

  • As someone in an administrative role, while I may not have much opportunity to apply what I learned in direct service work with youth, the training deepened my understanding of the core values, principles, and goals of [our organizations] approach to youth service, and will inform my work as part of the grants team.

    Nov. ‘23 Participant

  • Each [session] I was able to learn and connect with a new staff member. These conversations provided me a better understanding of the roles within [our organization] and how these different roles allow for unique interpersonal relationships to be made with youth.

    Nov. ‘23 Participant

How can PYD help you?

If you’re interested in using PYD at your place of work or in your team, send us some basic details and we will connect!

(Unsolicited vendors will not be contacted)