This Urban Institute study offers findings on how food insecurity impacts youth (ages 10 to 17), based on interviews and case studies of youth who participated in 20 focus groups in 10 communities. Discussion covers not only the data about food insecurity for teens, but also reflects the strategies that teens employ to mitigate or hide the effects of food insecurity.

Data analysis in this U.S. Government Accountability Office report shows that nearly 2 million at-risk college students did not report receiving SNAP benefits. The report also highlights the risk factors for food insecurity among this population. This analysis is based on survey results from 14 colleges and discusses resources that these higher education institutions provide to students to address food insecurity and help them apply for Federal food and nutritional assistance programs.

This Annie E. Casey Foundation blogpost features lessons from Maryland MENTOR to illustrate how to improve the quality and quantity of mentoring programs. Also mentioned are projects that Maryland MENTOR has initiated to increase the number of mentors, including convening town halls, building professional development skills for mentors, and creating a database to connect volunteers with young people looking for mentors. While this organization’s scope is limited to Maryland, some findings noted in the blogpost can be used to help grow and support mentoring programs nationally.

This Jobs for the Future report profiles the Opportunity Works program, a national effort to create postsecondary education and career pathways for over 2,000 out-of-school and out-of-work youth. The research in this report identifies four strategies for program success: place community-based organizations at the center, locate the “sweet spot” of a guiding model, provide excellent programming, and plan for program sustainability from the beginning.

This 2015 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Youth Risk Behavior Survey offers comprehensive data on health-risk behaviors among youth and young adults, including the prevalence of teen dating violence. The survey data in this report is drawn from the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System and covers 37 state surveys and 19 large urban school district surveys conducted among grades 9–12 students.

This Aspen Institute report describes The Opportunity Youth Forum (OYF), an initiative of the Aspen Institute Forum for Community Solutions. Collaborative approaches funded under this program represent multiple stakeholders working together to remove barriers for underserved youth by creating comprehensive pathways for education, family-sustaining careers, and successful adulthood. Launched in 2017, The Youth Entrepreneurship Fund responded to OYF by supporting youth entrepreneurship programs for school age youth; enhancing business development programs that provide educational, financial, and advisory services; and expanding experiential and social enterprise programs.

This National Institute of Justice report identifies how the standard functional family therapy (FFT) manual was tailored to address issues common to the gang population. Prior to this study, there had been a lack of any in-depth evaluations of therapeutic programs targeting an urban and mostly minority population at high risk of or currently involved in gangs. The study “was intended to provide a rigorous test of FFT under contemporary natural conditions, with an urban, predominantly minority population selected for its high risk of gang involvement.”

This issue brief from the National Mentoring Partnership identifies the role that mentoring can play in the lives of youth through career exploration and workforce development activities leading to greater employability. It distinguishes between developmental mentoring, which focuses on healthy and positive social development, and instrumental mentoring, which promotes skill development and targeted goal setting.

This toolkit from the National Mentoring Partnership offers some tips and resources on how best to celebrate National Mentoring Partnership in January 2019.

This MDRC evaluation report assesses a Transitional Living Program that targets youth in foster care or involved with the juvenile justice system. Youth Villages, a social service organization, created YVLife Set to provide individualized and intensive clinically focused case management, support, and counseling to help secure positive outcomes for young participants as they move to adulthood.