The Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs (IWGYP, or Working Group) is a group within the executive branch of the U.S. government, and is responsible for promoting healthy outcomes for all youth, including disconnected youth and youth who are at-risk. The Working Group also engages with national, state, local and tribal agencies and organizations, schools, and faith-based and community organizations that serve youth. [1]
Membership of the Working Group includes staff from 18 federal departments and agencies that support programs and services that target youth. The Working Group was formally established by Executive Order 13459, Improving the Coordination and Effectiveness of Youth Programs, on February 7, 2008. [2]
The Working Group has developed a Federal Interagency Website on Youth: Youth.gov. This website houses federally developed tools and resources, as well as resources submitted by those working in the field, to help youth-serving organizations and community partnerships as they work to promote positive youth outcomes.
The IWGYP is responsible for promoting achievement of positive outcomes for youth through the following key activities:
In addition, the IWGYP is responsible for preparing a strategic plan for federal youth policy (Omnibus Appropriations Act, 2009 Committee Print of the House Committee on Appropriations on H.R. 1105/Public Law 111-8, Division F). The current draft plan, Pathways for Youth: Draft Strategic Plan for Federal Collaboration, serves as a strengths-based vision for youth that acknowledges the importance of pathways to opportunity for youth that include meaningful connections and safe, healthy, and stable places to live, learn, and work.
The plan includes three main goals, with corresponding objectives, as well as cross-cutting initiatives that will move the plan forward. The three goals of Pathways for Youth are to:
Membership of the Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs includes staff from twelve Federal agencies that support programs and services that target youth:
The Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs was formally established by Executive Order 13459, Improving the Coordination and Effectiveness of Youth Programs, on February 7, 2008.
The Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs has developed a Federal Interagency Website on Youth (Youth.gov), which houses federally developed tools and resources, as well as resources submitted by those working in the field, to help youth-serving organizations and community partnerships. Youth.gov seeks to benefit federal agencies, youth service providers, and the youth-serving community. The tools and resources available on the website include resources to assist communities and others with:
Topics include:
The Working Group seeks to develop additional strategies, tools, and resources accessible through the Youth.gov that can help promote effective community-based efforts that address youth risk and protective factors.
The Youth.gov Program Directory is a searchable database that provides users with information about evidence-based programs whose purpose is to prevent and/or reduce problem behaviors in young people (under age 18). Communities can use this tool to determine whether replicating these strategies will meet local needs.
Two sets of programs are included:
1. The Teen Pregnancy Prevention program directory. Under a contract with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Mathematica Policy Research conducted an independent systematic review of the evidence base for programs to prevent teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, and/or sexual risk behaviors.
This review defined the criteria for the quality of an evaluation study and the strength of evidence for a particular intervention. Based on these criteria, HHS has defined a set of rigorous standards an evaluation must meet in order to be considered an evidence-based program. The review is being updated on an ongoing basis.
2. The Substance Abuse, Violence, and Other Risk Behavior program directory. . Through a partnership with the U.S. Department of Justice, programs are assessed by expert study reviewers from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s (OJJDP’s) Model Programs Guide (MPG), using www.CrimeSolutions.gov program review process, scoring instrument, and evidence standards. The MPG is an easy-to-use program database established to assist practitioners, policymakers, and communities in identifying and implementing programs that can make a difference in the lives of children and families. Information includes child victimization, substance abuse, youth violence, mental health and trauma, and gang activity.
In addition to the searchable Program Directory, the Youth.gov site also maintains the website A Guide to Evidence and Innovation, which aims to help organizations select, implement, monitor, and evaluate evidence-based programs and strategies. The website includes information that can assist organizations in identifying what they are hoping to address through implementation, assessing their readiness and capacity, finding programs that meet their needs, adapting programs while maintaining fidelity, and conducting ongoing evaluation and monitoring. Users can also learn about federal efforts around evidence and the evidence base to support policies and programs as well as watch videos featuring experts in the field that can guide their program implementation efforts.
The IWGYP has developed a series of collaboration profiles to promote enhanced collaboration at the federal, state, and local levels. The profiles provide real-world examples of the ways that different organizations work together to improve outcomes for youth. Each collaboration is unique in their purpose, accomplishments, how they structure their work, the challenges that they face, and the types of organizations that are involved.
Featured collaboration profiles include:
The IWGYP has begun to identify other promising Federal initiatives with which to engage, including the following agencies and groups:
The Working Group is charged with identifying and engaging key government and private or nonprofit organizations that can play a role in improving the coordination and effectiveness of programs serving and engaging youth, such as faith-based and other organizations, community coalitions and partnerships, businesses, volunteers and other key constituencies.
The Medical Reserve Corps (MRC) is a network in the U.S. of community-based units initiated and established by local organizations aimed at meeting the public health needs of their communities. It is sponsored by the Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR) of the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The MRC consists of medical and non-medical volunteers who contribute to local health initiatives, such as activities meeting the Surgeon General's priorities for public health, and supplement existing response capabilities in times of emergency. The MRC provides the structure necessary to pre-identify, credential, train, and activate medical and public health volunteers.
The Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974 (JJDPA) is a United States federal law providing formula grants to states that follow a series of federal protections on the care and treatment of youth in the juvenile justice and criminal justice systems.
Rape crisis centers in the United States, usually capitalized as Rape Crisis Center and often abbreviated as RCC, are community-based organizations affiliated with the anti-rape movement in the U.S. Rape crisis centers in other countries offer similar services, but have different histories and vary in their organizational structure.
Operation Ceasefire (also known as the Boston Gun Project and the Boston Miracle) is a problem-oriented policing initiative implemented in 1996 in Boston, Massachusetts. The program was specifically aimed at youth gun violence as a large-scale problem. The plan is based on the work of criminologist David M. Kennedy.
The United States Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) is an independent federal agency within the U.S. executive branch that leads the implementation of the federal strategic plan to prevent and end homelessness. USICH is advised by a Council, which includes the heads of its 20 federal member agencies.
Juvenile delinquency in the United States refers to crimes committed by children or young people, particularly those under the age of eighteen.
Communities That Care (CTC) is a program of the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) in the office of the United States Government's Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). CTC is a coalition-based prevention operating system that uses a public health approach to prevent youth problem behaviors such as violence, delinquency, school drop out and substance abuse. Using strategic consultation, training, and research-based tools, CTC is designed to help community stakeholders and decision makers understand and apply information about risk and protective factors, and programs that are proven to make a difference in promoting healthy youth development, in order to most effectively address the specific issues facing their community's youth.
Futures Without Violence is a non-profit organization with offices in San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and Boston, United States, with the goal of ending domestic and sexual violence. Futures Without Violence is involved in community-based programs, developing educational materials, and in public policy work.
The United States Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) coordinates and integrates federal research on changes in the global environment and their implications for society. The program began as a presidential initiative in 1989 and was codified by Congress through the Global Change Research Act of 1990, which called for "a comprehensive and integrated United States research program which will assist the Nation and the world to understand, assess, predict, and respond to human-induced and natural processes of global change."
A working group is a group of experts working together to achieve specified goals. Such groups are domain-specific and focus on discussion or activity around a specific subject area. The term can sometimes refer to an interdisciplinary collaboration of researchers, often from more than one organization, working on new activities that would be difficult to sustain under traditional funding mechanisms. Working groups are variously also called task groups, workgroups, technical advisory groups, working parties, or task forces.
The Arctic policy of the United States is the foreign policy of the United States in regard to the Arctic region. In addition, the United States' domestic policy toward Alaska is part of its Arctic policy.
The National Sexual Violence Resource Center (NSVRC) is an American nonprofit organization that addresses the causes and impact of sexual violence through collaboration, prevention, and resources. Working in collaboration with state and territory sexual assault coalitions, representatives from underserved populations, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. Department of Justice's Office on Violence Against Women, and a host of community-based and national allied projects, NSVRC provides national leadership to address and prevent sexual violence.
The White House released the United States' first strategy to address "ideologically inspired" violence in August 2011. Entitled Empowering Local Partners to Prevent Violent Extremism in the United States, the eight-page document outlines "how the Federal Government will support and help empower American communities and their local partners in their grassroots efforts to prevent violent extremism." The strategy was followed in December 2011 by a more detailed Strategic Implementation Plan for Empowering Local Partners to Prevent Violent Extremism in the United States. The National Strategy for Empowering Local Partners and the strategic implementation plan (SIP) resulted from the identification of violent extremism and terrorism inspired by "al-Qaeda and its affiliates and adherents" as the "preeminent security threats" to the United States by the 2010 National Security Strategy and the 2011 National Strategy for Counterterrorism. Regardless of the priorization of the threat from al-Qaeda's ideology, both the strategy and SIP are geared towards all types of extremism without focus on a particular ideology.
The National Interagency Confederation for Biological Research is a biotechnology and biodefense partnership and collaborative environment of eight U.S. Federal government agencies through the National Interagency Biodefense Campus (NIBC) at Fort Detrick, Maryland, US. NICBR was created in the wake of the September 11 attacks and the 2001 anthrax attacks as a way to bring a whole-of-government approach to addressing bioterrorism threats. Before this, countering biological weapons fell to the Department of Defense (DoD) and focused on protection of troops in the field.
The Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) is the principal advisory group to the United States Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on policy development and provides coordination and support for HHS's strategic and policy planning, planning and development of legislation, program evaluation, data gathering, policy-related research, and regulatory program.
The White House Initiative on Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders (WHIAANHPI) is a United States governmental office that coordinates an ambitious whole-of-government approach to advance equity, justice, and opportunity for Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders. The Initiative collaborates with the Deputy Assistant to the President and AA and NHPI Senior Liaison, White House Office of Public Engagement and designated federal departments and agencies to advance equity, justice, and opportunity for AA and NHPIs in the areas of economic development, education, health and human services, housing, environment, arts, agriculture, labor and employment, transportation, justice, veterans affairs, and community development.
Esta Soler is an American activist who founded the social justice organization Futures Without Violence, and serves as president of FUTURES.
Community crime prevention relates to interventions designed to bring reform to the social conditions that influence, and encourage, offending in residential communities. Community crime prevention has a focus on both the social and local institutions found within communities which can influence crime rates, specifically juvenile delinquency.
Lynn Rosenthal, M.P.A., is an American policy maker, expert, activist, and consultant for gender-based violence, sexual assault, and domestic violence serving as the first White House Advisor on Violence Against Women appointed by President Barrack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden in 2009. Rosenthal is the Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Office of Population Affairs and the director of the Office of Adolescent Health. At the Department of Health and Human Services, Rosenthal is the Director of Sexual Violence and Gender-Based Violence. Rosenthal serves as the president of The Center for Family Safety and Healing. Previously, Rosenthal was the director of Violence Against Women Initiatives for the Biden Foundation in 2017.