USA

Site located in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA

The Global Early Adolescent Study is partnering with the Institute of Women and Ethnic Studies (IWES), a national non-profit health organization domiciled in New Orleans. IWES is dedicated to improving the mental, physical and spiritual health and quality of life for women, their families and communities of color, particularly among marginalized populations, using community-engaged research, health education programs, training, advocacy and partnerships.  In 1993, IWES was incorporated as a 501(c)(3), community-centered public health organization, and has remained deeply committed to promoting comprehensive health and quality of life through social change, public policy and collaboration. Over the years, the organization has developed culturally proficient, multidisciplinary and holistic public health programs, activities, and research models around the following: adolescent sexual health, community well-being and resilience, and community mental health. In 2006, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, a division of post-disaster emotional resiliency, the Collective for Healthy Communities (CHC), was developed to address the human recovery needs of communities of color, particularly among women and children, in New Orleans. CHC addresses the context within which vulnerable youth live, as defined by their dependent relationships with family and caretakers, their community and the larger society and institutions; all of which cumulatively affect their individual actions and behaviors. For the past 8 years, IWES has collected data on the levels of traumatic stress disorders in over 4000 youth ages 11-16 years old; the data continue to show an elevation of traumatic stress symptoms 2-3 times the national rates. Considering the relationships between healthy decision-making, risk behaviors and trauma, all of IWES’ adolescent sexual health programs are trauma-responsive and prescriptive.

IWES and GEAS are partnering on a youth program called Catapult. Catapult includes both the administration of the GEAS instruments and an evaluation of Creating a Future Together (CrAFT), a trauma-informed, gender-transformative comprehensive sex education intervention. This study is evaluating the impact of CrAFT as compared to a standardized evidence-based sex education program among adolescents aged 11-14 in middle schools in New Orleans.

The CrAFT curriculum is rooted in a human rights framework, and integrates trauma-informed and gender-transformative approaches. The integration of these three core elements fosters a deeper personalization of content and is intended to improve overall student engagement with the material. This allows participants to consider their lived experience within the broader societal context in which they live and grow. The underlying theory of this intervention posits that when young people have the tools and language to understand and interrogate the gender messages they receive in their daily lives, they will be empowered to make healthier decisions about their bodies and their individuality.

By coupling CrAFT with the GEAS study, we hope to develop an understanding of the factors in early adolescence that predispose young people to subsequent sexual health risk. We hope that the findings from this study will help inform best practices in adolescent sexual health programming in New Orleans and around the world.