Host & Guests
Host: Ben Kirshner, Professor and Program Chair of Learning Sciences and Human Development, University of Colorado Boulder
Bianca Baldridge, Associate Professor of Education, Harvard University
Vanessa Roberts, Executive Director, Project VOYCE
Deepa Vasudevan, Researcher, Human Services: Youth, Family, & Community Development, American Institutes for Research, AIR
Sarai Hertz-Velázquez, Student, Wellesley College
I think there's such a critical urgency to not only study the experiences of youth workers to ensure that they are professionally taken care of so that they have livable wages, they have benefits and healthcare. But also recognizing that they have amazing expertise in working with young people in communities, and they always have.
— Bianca Baldridge
About the Series
Youth workers from historically marginalized communities serve as important mentors to young people in out-of-school-time (OST) programs. But in a 2020 student-led survey of youth in OST programs, many of these workers reported experiencing racism in the workplace, along with low wages and job instability. In this episode of Beyond the Classroom, researchers and practitioners discuss strategies for addressing these challenges in order to more effectively recruit and retain skilled youth workers.
