Bright spots, pain points, and radical futures: A youth participatory research study of Out-of-School Time programs

Early in the COVID-19 quarantine, Arundhati Roy wrote, “The pandemic is a portal.” Inspired by Roy’s 2020 essay, in this proposed session we discuss findings from a recent intergenerational participatory research study and engage in social dreaming about learning and development outside of school. With funding from the Wallace Foundation, we formed an intergenerational team of 11 college and high school students and four “adult” university-based researchers to investigate problems of practice and innovations related to equity and justice in OST programming. Data sources included four peer-to-peer virtual focus groups (N= 4) and an online survey designed by students (N= 98). Our data analysis identified young people’s ideas about bright spots and pain points for the OST field and identified implications from these findings to re-imagine and re-design the OST sector. This interactive session will engage audience members in conversations about issues of design, access, and equity in OST programs. The presenters will be five youth members of the team and two university researchers. After an opening activity in which audience reflect on their own experiences in OST programs, we will discuss findings related to 1) OST bright spots ; 2) OST pain points; and 3) strategies we developed to carry out youth participatory research online. We will close the session by inviting the audience to engage with us in collective social dreaming about how we can work to make the future of OST programs and practice more just, humanizing, and dignity-conferring.