Positive youth development, or PYD, refers to intentional efforts of other youth, adults, communities, government agencies, and schools to provide opportunities for youth to enhance their interests, skills, and abilities into their adulthoods. Youth development overall is the physical, social, and emotional processes that occur during the adolescent period, from ages 10 until 24 years. Simply speaking, it is the process through which young people acquire the cognitive, social, and emotional skills and abilities required to navigate life (University of Minnesota Extension Center for Youth Development). Although the word 'youth' can be used synonymously with 'child', 'adolescent', or 'young person', the phrase 'youth development' or 'positive youth development' is usually used in the scientific literature and by practitioners who work with youth to refer to programs designed to optimize these processes. It is distinguished from 'child development' or 'adolescent development' in its focus on the active promotion of optimal human development, rather than on the scientific study of age related change.
Read more about Positive Youth Development: Importance of Youth Development, Key Characteristics, Practices and Current Directions, Using Positive Youth Development, See Also
Famous quotes containing the words positive, youth and/or development:
“I believe, as Maori people do, that children should have more adults in their lives than just their mothers and fathers. Children need more than one or two positive role models. It is in your children’s best interest that you help them cultivate a support system that extends beyond their immediate family.”
—Stephanie Marston (20th century)
“Well, youth is the period of assumed personalities and disguises. It is the time of the sincerely insincere.”
—V.S. (Victor Sawdon)
“On fields all drenched with blood he made his record in war, abstained from lawless violence when left on the plantation, and received his freedom in peace with moderation. But he holds in this Republic the position of an alien race among a people impatient of a rival. And in the eyes of some it seems that no valor redeems him, no social advancement nor individual development wipes off the ban which clings to him.”
—Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (1825–1911)