The Power of Youth Advocacy

We’re hard at work creating Season 3 of A Flourishing Start. In the meantime, we’re excited to share this BONUS episode with you!

In this conversation, Dana, Fiona, and Esme explore what it means to be a youth advocate, the different ways a young person can engage in advocacy, how advocacy experiences differ as a youth versus as an adult, and how adults can support youth advocates. They discuss their experiences with youth commissions, challenges they have faced in their advocacy work, the importance of redefining what qualifies as experience in the professional world, and how they are each using advocacy to create a more inclusive and equitable world in which young people can thrive.

Esmeralda Cortez Rosales is a Community Policy Associate at the National Center for Youth Law and leads the organization's efforts to improve infant and early childhood mental health (or IECMH) for children zero to five years old across California. Esme works with parents, caregivers, community leaders, and advocates to develop and implement community-based work that centers children and families.

Fiona Lu is a second-year student at University of California, Los Angeles studying Public Affairs and Labor Studies. Fiona has been a youth advocate since high school, where she led K-12 education policy work in Generation Up (GENup), a youth-led organization dedicated to educational equity. Now, Fiona co-leads a youth advocacy movement called What We All Deserve, which propels young people to engage in policymaking for basic needs access and economic justice. She’s passionate about bettering the lives for children and families in California and across the nation through equity-centered policymaking.

Dana Paycao, who facilitates this conversation, is Senior Policy Coordinator at the National Center for Youth Law. Dana’s role includes partnering with young people to advance policies impacting youth mental health.

Highlights:
Defining Advocacy
Youth Commissions
Navigating an Adult-Led System
Tokenization and Genuine Youth Inclusion
Supporting and Listening to Youth Advocates
Building Relationships and Unity
Compensation and Immediate Needs
The Role of Adult Allies
Challenges Faced by Young Advocates
Redefining Experience

Resources:
www.youthlaw.org The National Center for Youth Law (NCYL) works to center youth voices to transform child serving systems, such as education, health, and the justice system, to reach a world in which every child thrives.
www.whatwealldeserve.carrd.co What We All Deserve is a youth-led movement to expand basic needs, the social safety net, and broader economic justice and liberation for a future in which everyone is able to fulfill their aspirations.
www.generationup.net GenerationUp (GENup) is a nationwide student-led social justice organization and coalition that advocates for education through community organizing and policy reform.
www.ignitenational.org Ignite National harnesses the political power of young women and non-binary people through community building, cultivating leadership skills, and celebrating ambitions.

Interested in sharing your story or suggesting a topic? Reach out to us at [email protected]. We'd love to hear from you.

This episode is brought to you by the National Center for Youth Law, with support from the Resilience Effect initiative by Genentech, a Roche Group member.