PRYDE Youth Investigators

The Youth Investigators Program at a Glance:

• The PRYDE Youth Investigators Program offers teens a crash course in Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR), encouraging them to ask critical questions about their own communities — and giving them the tools to answer these questions.

• The Youth Investigators Program is delivered through a student workbook containing five modules. These modules cover the entire lifecycle of a social science research project.

• The program is available for use in schools or youth programs. (Contact information below.)

For years, PRYDE’s practitioner partners have pointed out a need for high quality, hands-on research experiences for youth. In response, PRYDE created the Youth Investigators Program.

Youth Investigators offers adolescents an engaging social science research experience — experiential learning opportunities across each phase of the research process. The program is delivered through a student workbook containing five modules, providing youth with a foundational understanding of how research is conducted. Teens in the program (i.e: Youth Investigators) will learn how to formulate a research question, use qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection, analyze their data, and disseminate their findings for social change.

Youth Investigators offers a portable model of youth participatory action research (YPAR) that can be applied to a range of research projects. Upon completion of the Youth Investigators curriculum, youth “graduate” from the program with the skills that are necessary to execute their own research projects — or to even get involved in another project as student researchers.

The curriculum is intended to help youth consider career paths in social science, develop scientific competencies, and reflect on their identities and goals through experiential learning. The program aims to prepare youth to be critical thinkers who can evaluate the validity of claims they encounter in a variety of settings, both online and offline. Successful graduates are empowered with the knowledge to investigate questions they have about their world by using key principles of research to positively impact their own lives and communities.

If you are interested in bringing Youth Investigators to your own school, county, or youth program, contact Kristen Elmore (kce28@cornell.edu) and/or Casey Adrian (cwa39@cornell.edu) for more information.

Youth Investigators in Action Summit: Final Reports

Occasionally, PRYDE invites enthusiastic graduates of the Youth Investigators Program to the Cornell campus. Here, at the Youth Investigators in Action Summit, teens engage in a three-day crash course on social science research. Alongside Cornell faculty and staff, these adolescents develop their own research questions and hone the skills necessary to answer them. Ultimately, teens leave with recommendations for positive change in their own communities. These Summit events typically happen alongside 4-H Career Explorations, encouraging students to experiment with future educational and career paths that involve research.

Read reports from previous iterations of the Youth Investigators in Action Summit: