About this session

Saturday, 10:20 AM - 11:50 AM

Empowering Futures: Reimagining Learning Spaces for Girls

Reclamation is a critical feature of the healing justice framework that provides an opportunity to reclaim, redefine, and reimagine a possible future for youth (Ginwright, 2015). This can occur across various ecologies, including schools and communities, and necessitates exploring different learning settings that enable youth to reach their fullest potential (Nasir, 2024). The COVID-19 pandemic amplified our awareness of persistent inequalities affecting our youth, especially in a school context (Ladson-Billings, 2021). Consequently, understanding the role of formal and informal learning environment and experiences is crucial. For example, expanded learning and out-of-school time programs play a significant role in various aspects of youth development. Using community engaged and participatory practices, the papers in this symposium uniquely represent three examples of engaging girls in research opportunities that provide different types of learning opportunities. Study 1 finds that among mostly Black and Latina adolescent girls, various factors influence how they conceptualize and define empowerment in a community space designed for young women. Study 2 finds that certain factors dictate why Latina youth may engage in certain research opportunities. Study 3 finds that critical conversation spaces (Carter Andrews et al., 2019), combat school misogynoir for Black girls and women. By breaking away from research habits that perpetuate siloing, divergence, and disconnection (Nasir, 2024), we can begin reimagining the future of learning environments for communities of color, especially for girls and young women of color.

Paper #1
Title	“I really loved all of us girls coming together”: Empowering Youth through a Community-Led Conference
Presenting author	Chelsea T. McElwee, University of California, Riverside, United States

Paper #2
Title	Carving pathways for future Latina researchers through the use of youth participatory action research
Presenting author	Bernardette Pinetta, University of California, Los Angeles, United States

Paper #3
Title	Conversations in Color: Conceptualizing an Intersectional Awareness of Anti-Black Gendered Racism Among University-Based Black Girls
Presenting author	Gabrielle Kubi, University of Michigan, United States

View all paper details

Session chair
Chelsea T. McElwee, University of California, Riverside, United States

Discussant
Lauren Mims, Ph.D., New York University, United States

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