The worksheets and checklists below will help agencies and communities begin their own youth engagement projects. PSN Task Forces interested in receiving additional training in these specific areas of engagement should visit the Training and Technical Assistance page.

Strategic Planning

Assessment

• Tips on Engaging Youth (checklist): This checklist assesses how ready a program is to include youth in its gang prevention efforts.  It gauges readiness in the areas of recruitment, support, and evaluation, and helps set a baseline for current efforts as well as goals for the future.
  

• Conducting Youth Focus Groups: A basic overview on how to conduct focus groups for youth, including information on preparation, documentation, and reporting.  A brief facilitator guide and sample focus group questions are also included.
  

• Community Engagement Self Assessment: This worksheet provides a planning tool aimed at helping groups identify where and how they are engaging different sectors in the community. 
  

• Community Assets worksheet: This worksheet can be used as a planning exercise to identify the stakeholders and assets available in a community.
  

Identifying Stakeholders

• Potential Stakeholders and Resources worksheet: This worksheet, which helps to identify additional stakeholders and resources during the planning process, provides opportunities to collaborate and further coordinate efforts.
  
  
• Stakeholder Web worksheet: An organizational web diagram to assist in brainstorming potential stakeholders and resources.  This worksheet is Ideal for youth and working in groups.
  
  
• Stakeholder Letter: A sample stakeholder letter for youth to use to recruit and gather stakeholders to be a part of their project.  The letter is a good youth development tool because it requires youth to do research and develop writing skills.

Developing Goals*

• Defining Goals, Objectives and Activities: This worksheet provides a framework for groups to create goals, objectives and activities to guide a project or group effort.
  
  
• Logic Model Template: This evaluation tool is also helpful in program planning, to detect and show the logical sequence of identifying problems and forming goals, objectives, and activities to respond to those problems, as well as identifying outcome measures.
  
  
• Planning Next Steps worksheet: This worksheet helps to outline goals and objectives for youth engagement programs, and gives planners a way to record action items to achieve objectives and designate who is responsible and timelines for the completion of each item.
  
  
• Youth Leadership Matrix: Depicts the various levels of youth involvement possible in a program, ranging from “Youth as Clients” to “Youth Led”.  This worksheet is a good planning tool for determining the direction of a youth engagement initiative.
  
  
• Criteria-Based Issue Selection: This exercise is appropriate for when a group of youth has discussed several issues, and is ready to prioritize the issues to focus on.  The activity applies democratic principles to criteria-based decision making and explores other democratic voting processes.
  
  
• Committee Task Sheet example: Once goals, objectivities and activities have been identified, the committee task sheet is useful in helping a group organize which tasks will be completed, by whom and the date for completion.
  

• Blank Committee Task Sheet
  

*Also see the National Youth Gang Center's website for worksheets on planning for implementation of gang prevention programs

Exercises and Activities

Media Tools to Guide Discussions

• Stop the Violence: Several young men talk about the influences in their lives that led them into a life of drugs, guns, and crime.  All shared a watershed experience of being shot and paralyzed.  They talk poignantly about what they wish they had known as they were making the choices they made and how their lives would be different if they had made different decisions.  Produced by Operation Ceasefire in the District of Columbia.
  
  
• The Children's March: This powerful video describes the role that children played in the historic civil rights march in 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama.  The discussion of this video can effectively highlight the critical role that today's young people can play in being catalysts for positive social change.

Learning Activities

• New Mexico Media Literacy Project: The New Mexico Media Literacy Project was founded in 1993 and continues to be a forerunner in national media literacy education.  The mission of the project is to build engaged communities through the use of media education.  As a more interactive platform of the Literacy Project, the Media Literacy Toolkit was launched to allow interested parties to browse, purchase and download individual "media literacy kits" on a variety of topics.  The kits can be utilized in a classroom setting, in community groups, and in other group settings as a way to teach basic media literacy concepts, to deconstruct a broad array of media messages, and to understand current media issues.
  
  
• Cross the Line exercise: This is an exercise to help youth build a sense of understanding and respect for their peers, based on identifying mutual experiences.
  
  
• Community Problem Solvers: This is an exercise for youth that helps them explore the characteristics of good problem solvers, and think about how to be an active member of the community.
  
  
• What is a Community worksheet: This exercise asks youth to explore the physical and cultural aspects of their communities and what makes communities strong.

Team Building Activities

• Pledge: The Student Pledge Against Gun Violence is a national program that highlights the role youth can play in reducing gun violence in their communities. Students campaign for gun safety throughout the year and encourage their peers to commit to a life of nonviolence. The program promotes a Day of National Concern about Young People and Gun Violence each year as a jumping off point for educating youth about the dangers of gun violence. Information and resources are readily available for teachers, counselors, and community leaders who are interested in integrating the Student Pledge curriculum into their academic programs.
  
  
• Team Building examples: Examples of activities that help nurture team spirit and trust in groups of youth working together.  Activities range from icebreakers to group problem solving, and the purpose of each activity, materials and time needed, directions, and follow-up questions are included.

Group Process Resources

• Group Process Tools for Working with Youth: This assortment of approaches for working with youth includes ideas for setting up groups, facilitating group discussions, and maximizing positive interactions in activities.  These tools are beneficial for anyone starting a new program and can be used to establish basic program structure.
  
  
• Sustaining Youth Involvement: Tips for sustaining involvement in a youth engagement initiative, including orientation, meeting formats, roles for mentors, and training.