Facilitating innovative youth encounters for well-being and healing

Abstract

This research is based on a youth intervention organisation founded by the researcher in 1997. The organisation (Agape Copeland Train) is located in the Northern Cape. Youths’ contexts in the Northern Cape are fraught with psychological, social and relational problems, including violence, alcoholism, teenage pregnancies, depression, crime, poverty, and curtailed future prospects. An exploratory enquiry, informed by ecological and positive psychology, is undertaken. In particular, this research focuses on the (often neglected) perspectives of facilitators who work with youth. Exploration of how facilitators’ well-being is impacted on whilst serving youth in this challenging context is undertaken. Interviews with facilitators yielded themes of positive transformation, including shifts in mindsets and positive affect. In addition, aspects of the organisation’s development, as relevant to the context of the research, are described and a model of youth facilitation process, as developed by facilitators within the organisation, is presented. The researcher’s own experiences in the organisation (as director and as a facilitator) are reflected upon. Observations, incidents, and experiences are used as additional data sources. Facilitating vulnerable youth from an ecological systems perspective is an intricate, reflexive, complex and challenging process.