This research study has been conducted to explore and describe the perceptions and experiences of out-of-school youth regarding their access to the youth services available to them. A qualitative approach is followed and an exploratory, descriptive and contextual research design is utilized. The sample of the study was procured by means of purposive sampling. Data were collected by means of focus group discussions which were conducted using a questioning guide. Data were analysed according to the steps for qualitative data analysis provided by Tesch in Creswell (1994). To ensure the trustworthiness of the research findings, Guba’s model in Krefting (1991) was employed. The research findings were verified against the existing body of knowledge in order to compare and contrast the themes and sub-themes that emerged from the process of data analysis. The main themes that emerged from the study are lack of knowledge regarding available services, Needs or desires of out-of-school youth, hindrances or obstacles to access available youth services, suggestions for services relevant to needs of out-of-school youth and suggestions to make out-of-school youth aware of available services.

Black youth in South Africa has for decades, been marginalized in development programmes and many young blacks are experiencing poverty. With the advent of the new South Africa in 1994, the government initiated poverty alleviation projects for youth development. These projects offered black youth an opportunity to participate in their own development. The current study aimed at critically analyzing the contribution of a „Poverty Alleviation‟ programme for youth development. The study was conducted at Cala in the Sakhisizwe local municipality in the Chris Hani District of the Eastern Cape. The study utilized qualitative and quantitative research methods and took the form of exploratory research. The study revealed factors that appear to contribute to the ineffectiveness of youth development projects. The identified factors include the lack of participation of project members, lack of a sense of ownership and commitment, insufficient skills and non-use of policy and guiding documents by project members during the implementation stage. Stakeholder participation and sharing of expertise was identified as another important factor in determining the contribution of poverty alleviation projects to youth development. Lastly, the study shows that monitoring and evaluation of the project functions are necessary to ensure that a project like this achieves the desired outcome. A key recommendation made is that project members must be involved and participate fully in all project phases to enhance a sense of ownership and commitment to fellow project members.

This thesis is concerned with changing behaviour patterns of a number of unemployed disadvantaged youth associated with an intervention strategy called Career Start. Career Start uses computer-based technology in its instructional program, which attempts to address simultaneously three significant barriers to youth employment. These barriers are grade level attainment, low self-esteem, and destructive attitudes towards work. The participants in Career Start numbered 169 youths between the ages of 15 and 24. All had been classified as severely employment disadvantaged by the classification methods of Employment and Immigration Canada. The youths were interviewed to ascertain specific background characteristics and the reasons why they were unemployed. They were also tested before and after participation in the program to determine whether or not barriers to employment had been reduced. There was some evidence of improvement in academic scores, primarily in the language and mathematics areas. In addition, there was a reduction in the barriers to employment as measured by the Vocational Opinion Index. The Culture Free Self-Esteem Index also showed that the self-esteem of the participants was raised after participation in the program. The employment objectives of Employment and Immigration Canada were also taken into consideration during the study. During the first year the objectives were exceeded by 36 percent of the subjects and, during the first nine-month period of the second year, the objectives were again exceeded. Data were statistically analyzed using the Chi-square Test for Independence, the Non Parametric Sign Test, cross-tabulations, and frequency tables. The study indicated that Career Start had the potential to be a successful intervention strategy in addressing the problems of unemployed and disadvantaged youth. The research also generated a number of related issues in need of further study. / Education, Faculty of / Educational Studies (EDST), Department of / Graduate

Several studies showed adolescents living in temporary housing face multiple risks. The Floating Hospital (TFH), a non-profit organization serving homeless families in New York City, created the Camp Rise Up intervention as a six-day overnight camp to address these risks via a 14-lesson curriculum on the following topics: 1) communication; 2) self-esteem/body image; 3) anatomy; 4) alcohol and drugs; 5) puberty; 6) peer pressure; 7) pregnancy; 8) contraception; 9) gender and sexuality; 10) healthy relationships; 11) consent; 12) STIs/HIV; 13) media literacy; 14) managing emotions and conflict negotiation. Evaluation of Camp Rise Up compared pre-camp to post-camp mean scores for stage of change, self-efficacy, knowledge and social support for five behaviors of focus: saying “no” to sex, if pressured to have sex; talking about the need to use a condom every time, if you have sex; saying “no” to drugs, if pressured to use them; saying “no” to alcohol, if pressured to drink; and ending unhealthy relationships, if being abused. A secondary analysis of existing data collected by TFH on their August 2019 camp included a sample (n=24) that was 50.0% (n=11) Black, 36.4% (n= 8) Latinx, and 13.6% (n=3) mixed race with 13 girls (54.2%) and 11 boys (45.8%) with mean age of 13.26 (SD= 1.322, min=11, max=16). Results showed: a significant increase from pre-camp to post-camp for knowledge of how to say “no” to sex, if pressured (p=.002); self-rated knowledge for all 14 topics covered in the curriculum increased significantly from pre-lesson to post-lesson (p=.000); post-camp ratings for counselors, teachers, overall camp experience, and 14 lessons were all very good to excellent; and, majority of participants would recommend the camp to others, diffusing the innovation of Camp Rise Up. Emergent themes from qualitative data analysis were: camp was a fun positive experience, they made new friends, learned new things, and tried new things beyond their comfort zone, Findings may serve as preliminary studies data to justify grant funding to support a camp of longer duration with a larger sample size and long-term follow-up. The curriculum may find application in meeting needs of this vulnerable population for vital health education.

Thesis (MSc (Nursing))--Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2018 / Primary health care (PHC) is a frontline health care approach. It is the point of contact where people are kept well and where their quality of life is improved. All people diagnosed as HIV- positive are retested prior to antiretroviral therapy (ART) initiation to verify their serostatus. ART initiation is seen as a non-emergency treatment that provides many benefits if its initiation is accelerated, for example following up pregnant women after being diagnosed with HIV. However, accelerated initiation may lead clients to start treatment before they are ready to adhere to treatment outcomes. The purpose of this study was to describe the nurse support for young adults during a first antiretroviral therapy visit at an urban primary health care clinic in Malawi. A descriptive phenomenological design was followed at an urban setup in Zomba city, Malawi. The sample was selected through purposive sampling until data saturation was obtained. Individual semi- structured interviews were conducted with young adults aged 19 25 who have visited the clinic for their first ART according to an interview schedule and field notes for around 30 minutes in a private room. The data was analysed using distinctive process and a consensus meeting was held between the researcher and independent coder. The findings of the study could help the PHC services to retain and re-engage the young adults in HIV care and aid the Government of Malawi in achieving its Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3. Principles of trustworthiness and ethics were adhered to throughout the research process. Six themes, each with separate categories, emerged from the data analysis on the experience of young adults during their first visit for ART at an urban PHC clinic in Malawi. The results indicated the need for an environment that enhances a client-orientated approach with a focus on holistic well-being. Knowledge management should be used to provide relevant and sufficient information to a newcomer while maintaining ethics under difficult circumstances. The legal environment should have a focus on supporting clients that need comprehensive ART treatment. Motivation of the patient regarding taking antiretroviral treatment (ART) is thus essential. Young adults express the need to be supported by nurses with relevant information, privacy and confidentiality and the trusting client/nurse relationship which could help them to retain in ART care. Recommendations of this study was that nurses should be offered in-service training on youthfriendly programmes which focuses on the health care of young adults during their HIV/ART services. Nurses need to create trusting relationship for the young adults and providing in door game at the waiting area to keep them busy as they are waiting for the services. Nursing managers to lobby for funding to extend the clinic and be role models in providing relevant information to young adults. It was concluded that a first visit was both positive and challenging to the participant s; however, they experienced the health providers on the first visit to be caring and supportive.

This study analyzed data from Dallas Public Schools and Dallas Youth and Family Centers (YFCs) to explore variables associated with referrals to and utilization of Youth and Family Centers. Data from students enrolled in third, eighth or tenth grade during the 1996-1997, 1997-1998 and 1998-1999 school years were analyzed to determine the reasons for YFC referral and utilization, and to compare standardized test scores and attendance. Of the 6956 students in third, eighth and tenth grades initially referred to YFCs during those three school years, 5173 (74.3%) made at least one YFC visit. The 5173 students made an average of 2.69 visits and accessed an average of 1.18 services per year. Medical visits accounted for 42.5% of YFC visits, and mental health visits accounted for 46% of YFC visits. Results of logistic regression analyses indicate a significant difference for utilization upon referral and continued use of the YFC when the constant is compared to a set of predictor variables. For both analyses, the predictor variables were Chapter I status, LEP status, reason for referral, gender, special education status, ethnicity, distance from home school to referral YFC, food stamp eligibility and referral source. While outcome data regarding attendance and scores on standardized tests was limited to records available, results suggest that mean reading scores for eighth graders were significantly higher during Year 1 for the group that accessed YFC services. School attendance was better for eighth graders who made continued use of a YFC. Use of medical services by third graders was associated with a gain in attendance rather than a slight loss for the third graders who did not access medical services upon referral. Results of this study were limited by missing data for several records. The competitive atmosphere of health care service delivery and the practical need to know about service delivery at the sites should make data management a priority.

No description available.

This dissertation examines the fiscal and ideological deployments of community in publicly-funded yet independent nonprofit social service and healthcare provision. As at-risk youth leave families-of-origin in two American cities, they encounter a network of nonprofit providers conducting tailored and targeted outreach and managing access to benefits, services, and housing. Clients and outreach workers describe the ways they are monetized in an interconnected system of welfare and service provision and point to an expanding, entrapping, and extractive public health, housing, and benefits structure where community-building is the nonprofit profit mechanism. Following recent work on the “grow and hide” model of the American health care state (Grogan 2023), this fieldwork investigates on-the-ground impacts of hidden public funding and financing routed through private industry for nonprofit hospitals, clinics, community-based outreach arms, and public health-funded housing that has increased out of sight and without accountability to the public. Through fieldwork inside hospital-based clinics, nonprofit-adjacent “grassroots” campaigns, trade associations, and interviews with agency officials, bankers, nonprofit consultants, executives, and providers, this research untangles a skein of legislation and benefits policies that traps clients in proliferating categories of vulnerability. The material and psychological consequences of these policies for clients and their providers unspool inside nonprofit hospitals and clinics and their outreach arms—the site of public health intervention research, benefits navigation, and primary care provision in youth public health programs across the country. Within funding eddies enabled by municipal, state, and federal agency contracts with nonprofit service providers across healthcare and housing, a certain kind of client-subject is made who must either perform community or embrace mercenariness in policy-related underground economies. The municipal Community-Based Organization (CBO) and not the family (Cooper 2017) emerges as the unit propped up in the late devolutionary structure of welfare and service provision. State-funded independent nonprofits and their trade associations emerge as key architects from below of an expansive, hidden, and extractive healthcare-welfare state.

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration

No abstract available / Development Studies / M.A. (Development Studies)