For Nicholas Brown, attending the Lugo McGinness Academy was about more than completing assignments; it was a chance to dive deeply into a topic he was passionate about.
“It gave me the outlet to express myself,” he said.
Brown, a recent graduate of the Lugo-McGinness Academy in Charlottesville City Schools, participated in a nationally recognized, award-winning partnership between the academy and the Youth Action Lab, an initiative of the University of Virginia’s Youth-Nex, a research center at the School of Education and Human Development.
Known as youth participatory action research, or “YPAR,” the partnership framework empowers students to investigate issues that matter to them. After selecting their research topics, students are guided through the process to collect data, analyze results and explore actions they can take to respond to their findings.
Nicholas Brown receives his diploma from Charlottesville City Schools’ Lugo-McGinness Academy. Brown credits the UVA-Charlottesville schools program with making him a better communicator. (Contributed photo)
“Validating youth perspectives and opinions is a big part of YPAR,” said Olivia Burke, a doctoral student at the UVA School of Education and coordinator of the Youth Action Lab. “The framework helps adults say to youth, ‘We believe you, we hear you, we respect how you see the world and how you’ve experienced it.’”
For the past four years, Burke and the Youth Action Lab team have partnered with Lugo-McGinness Academy teacher Carly Dirghangi to bring YPAR to the students.
Burke and Dirghangi begin each yearlong project by asking the students to first reflect on topics that interest them.
“YPAR has been able to capture where students find joy,” Dirghangi said. “We asked, ‘What are you drawn to in life? What is something that you find yourself spending a lot of time thinking about?’”
The key point is to create space for youth to answer the questions that matter most to them.
“The conversations, that’s the biggest thing,” Brown said, when asked what he enjoyed most about the partnership. “It was very interactive. I was able to express myself the way I wanted to, without judgment.”
Each year, students conduct research on a range of topics, from schools and communities to the Civil Rights Movement, from filmmaking to basketball shoes.
“Engaging young people in scientific inquiry around topics that are meaningful to them in their communities and lives, while also valuing that time as an educational experience, is a really powerful learning opportunity for the students,” Burke said.
Brown agrees. “I learned how to participate in these types of discussions and how to be a bigger participant in school,” he said.
One temptation adults may have is to invite students’ perspectives on a project that has already been framed in a very adult-centric way.
Charlottesville City Schools teacher Carly Dirghangi, left, and Olivia Burke, a doctoral student at the UVA School of Education and Human Development who coordinates the Youth Action Lab, are partners in bringing the youth participatory action research program to students. (Contributed photos)
“Sometimes we’re asking kids to think too many steps ahead when we ask what they would like to change about their community, or at what big public-sector meeting could they present their research,” Dirghangi said.
Through their projects, some students were interested in speaking publicly about their research, presenting their findings to the local school board. Others were primarily engaging in research to create meaning for themselves and their own experience. Either way, the partnership doesn’t put the burden of change solely on the shoulders of the students.
“YPAR is not without adult support and perspectives,” Burke said. “Often, we are the ones who have the time and the resources to actually implement the students’ desired changes.”
For Burke, who is a third-year doctoral student studying research, statistics and evaluation, this partnership is a shining example of research values she holds dear.
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