How Positive Youth Development Enhances a CLA Approach

The USAID-funded Partnerships with Youth (PWY) project is using a positive youth development (PYD) approach to further enhance its collaborating, learning, and adapting (CLA) approach. Due to the instability in the West Bank and by design of the project, PWY has coupled the two approaches. For an effective youth development project, where youth empowerment and youth-adult relationships are crucial elements of success, a CLA and PYD approach helps to ensure that those supports and empowering attitudes flow to all levels. While this type of approach takes time, staff bandwidth, and resources, the quality of implementation is that much better when applied. PWY has worked to intentionally institute the principles of PYD in everything it does and to foster a culture of learning. As a result, its programming is continually improving, its partner youth centers are thriving, trusted, and really serving the needs of the youth in their communities, and the youth have been given the opportunity to develop and strengthen their own personal outcomes towards becoming productive adults.