The Advancing Youth Development: A Curriculum for Training Youth Workers (AYD) is used by facilitators to deliver youth development trainings to youth workers.

The curriculum has four broad learning goals. Participants in the training program will:

* Gain familiarity with the youth development approach and use this approach to explore, share, and learn new strategies for working with young people.
* Strengthen their ability to communicate their ideas, expertise and experience to their constituencies: board members, families, co-workers, community leaders, and youth.
* Discuss practical strategies for integrating a youth development approach into their programs.
* Form an informal network and become ongoing resources to each other.

Through NTI's National Training of Facilitators' (TOF) Program, BEST facilitators learn to deliver the 28-hour AYD curriculum in a seven session format:

* Session 1: Introduction to the Youth Development Approach
* Session 2: Developmental Youth Outcomes: The Bottom Line of Youth Workers
* Session 3: Cultural Assumptions and Stereotypes About Young People: From Adultism to Caring Adults
* Session 4: Strategies of Youth Participation
* Session 5: Opportunities and Supports for Youth Development: Identifying Best Program Practices
* Session 6: Core Competencies of Youth Workers
* Session 7: Review, Practice, and Celebration

NTI currently makes the AYD Curriculum and the Faciliator's Handbook for the AYD Curriculum available only to communities participating in the National BEST Network.

For additional information about NTI, please download our brochure in PDF format (193 KB) or contact us at:

National Training Institute for Community Youth Work
Academy for Educational Development
1825 Connecticut Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20009
Tel: 202.884.8334
Fax: 202.884.8460
E-mail: ejohnson@aed.org