UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs

Newark, New Jersey implemented a voting age of 16 for school board elections in April of 2025. This research brief presents findings from a multi-method implementation study. We interviewed 11 stakeholders about implementation successes and challenges. Qualitative insights were supplemented by survey findings from 334 11th and 12th graders in Newark. Implementation successes included high registration numbers and strong coalition building across organizations. However, Newark faced challenges to implementation, including limited accessibility, voter education, and time. These findings can inform Newark and other cities interested in implementing a lower voting age.

ABSTRACT Through a radical re‐reading of Orlando Fals Borda's conceptualization of participatory action research (PAR), I argue that PAR is more adequately grounded within the broader Fals Bordian framing of ciencia popular , defined as science for, with, and propelled by social movements. I problematize key elements of Fals Borda's works that illuminate the historical silencing of feminist thought and street‐level movement leaders of the Colombian left. Using the space created by Fals Borda's conceptual shortcomings, I share lessons learned through my friendship and shared movement space with Jhon Restrepo and Daniela Maldonado, organizers who embody a new kind of ciencia popular , which I call reparative science. I conclude with forward thinking on next steps for reparative science and articulate possible pathways forward toward a science that centers collective care in protective spaces that grow in distance from the dehumanizing structures of the nonprofit and academic industrial complexes. RESUMEN A partir de una relectura radical de la conceptualización de la investigación‐acción participativa (IAP) propuesta por Orlando Fals Borda, sostengo que la IAP se sitúa de manera más adecuada dentro del marco más amplio de la ciencia popular falsbordiana, entendida como una ciencia para, con y movida por los movimientos sociales. Problematizo elementos clave de la obra de Fals Borda que dejan en evidencia el silenciamiento histórico del pensamiento feminista y de les lideres y lideresas de base de la izquierda colombiana. Aprovechando el espacio que abren estas limitaciones conceptuales en la obra de Fals Borda, comparto los aprendizajes derivados de mi amistad y de los espacios de organización compartidos con Jhon Restrepo y Daniela Maldonado, organizadores que encarnan una nueva forma de ciencia popular, a la que llamo ciencia reparativa. Concluyo con una reflexión sobre los pasos a seguir para la ciencia reparativa y articulo posibles caminos hacia una ciencia que centre el cuidado colectivo en espacios protectores que crezcan a distancia de las estructuras deshumanizantes del complejo industrial académico y de las organizaciones sin ánimo de lucro.

Thinking from Los Angeles, amid the expanding criminalization of homelessness, we advance a conceptual framework of encampment geographies. We argue that the homeless encampment must be understood in relation to state power, specifically the state as landlord. As residents of state spaces—sidewalks, shelters, interim housing—encampment dwellers are institutionalized. This includes interpellation in humanitarian exchange, notably through forms of mutual aid that emerge in the interstices of state violence. Drawing on ethnographic research and movement histories at Aetna Street, we present three encampment geographies: return, refuge, and refusal. We conceptualize the encampment as a site of enforced return and a space of refuge whose residents are akin to refugees. In doing so, we situate the homeless encampment in a global geography of camps, drawing on literatures that are attentive to expulsion, containment, and asylum. Yet encampment residents refuse enclosure, in particular, exploitation and its articulation in wage–rent relations. In keeping with Aetna's history as a node of Black life in Los Angeles, we study these geographies of struggle guided by Black feminist theory, notably the Practicing Refusal Collective. In doing so, we conceptualize the encampment as a form of living within and beyond racial capitalism.

Youth suicide is a pressing public health concern requiring coordinated, cross-sector responses. This research presents findings from a pilot initiative involving ten California counties that used a multi-site participatory system mapping design to assess and strengthen youth crisis reporting and response systems. Funded through the Children and Youth Behavioral Health Initiative and supported by the California Department of Public Health, the pilot used visual tools to identify gaps, clarify roles, and promote shared understanding across sectors. System maps focused on six key components of crisis systems, supporting communities in developing targeted action plans and promoting system accountability. Results demonstrated that the mapping process catalyzed improvements in follow-up care, school and hospital coordination, and postvention practices. Challenges included navigating structural differences among partners and sustaining engagement. Findings suggest that system mapping is a replicable and equity-centered approach to the development of public health infrastructure.

LGBTQ+ youth globally face increased suicide risk, yet evidence from Latin America, particularly Peru, is limited. Understanding factors influencing suicidality among LGBTQ+ youth in Peru is essential for developing culturally relevant interventions. This study analyzed data from The Trevor Project's 2024 Peru National Survey on the Mental Health of LGBTQ+ Young People (N = 4,643; age 14-24, mean age = 17.34). Logistic regression models examined associations between suicide-related outcomes (lifetime and past-year suicidal ideation, past-year suicide attempts), and positive screens for depressive and anxiety symptoms, mental healthcare desire, sexual orientation "outness" and perceived community acceptance. Approximately 73.5% reported lifetime suicidal ideation, 55.0% past-year ideation and 37.1% past-year attempts. Positive screens for depressive and anxiety symptoms were associated with higher odds of suicidality (aOR range: 1.80-2.88). Compared to youth who did not desire care, both unmet (aOR range: 1.64-2.16) and met (aOR range: 1.26-1.36) mental healthcare desire were associated with higher odds of suicidality, with unmet need showing stronger effects. Higher outness (aOR range: 1.56-1.75), younger age (14-17 years), and gender diversity were associated with higher odds of suicidality. Findings highlight the urgent need for accessible, identity-affirming mental health interventions in Peru, tailored to developmental stages and responsive to the stressors faced by LGBTQ+ youth.

Abstract This article, co‐authored by encampment and university scholars, is concerned with how homeless persons challenge rightlessness. We do so by advancing a conceptual framework of common sense law, arguing that such contestations take place not only in courtrooms but also in the lived spaces of homelessness. Drawing on five years of ethnography, we foreground how homeless persons become proficient in the law as well as in self‐advocacy, navigating and resisting state power, be it the edicts of criminalization or the labyrinth of bureaucratization. In doing so, we seek to understand housing justice as rights from below as well as a process of making right, a form of redress for perceived injuries. Our conceptual framework of common sense law derives from the specificity of the North American context where homeless personhood is constituted both within and against liberal arrangements of property. Often deployed in spaces such as the street, where property arrangements are contested by those consigned to spatial precarity, common sense law is a re‐formation of liberalism and its constitutionally protected rights.

Scholars of youth civic development have assessed agency using a wide range of constructs, including motivation, efficacy, empowerment, and sociopolitical control. We propose a multidimensional framework and describe the development and validation of a measure of civic agency, conceptualized as competence, drive, individual power, and collective power. In Study 1, we developed a set of items and employed exploratory factor analysis with a pilot sample of adolescents (N = 295, M_age = 17.1, 65.4% youth of color, 47.9% female, 15.8% nonbinary), which supported our hypothesized four-factor model of civic agency. In Study 2, we conducted confirmatory factor analysis of our final items with a separate adolescent sample (N = 1120, M_age = 16.2, 73.0% youth of color, 55.7% female, 23.3% nonbinary), which demonstrated measurement invariance on race/ethnicity, gender, and age. In Study 3, we validated our scale in a sample of young activists (N = 342, M_age = 19.1, 57.6% youth of color, 72.6% female, 23.0% nonbinary). Confirmatory factor analysis supported a four-dimensional hierarchical structure and we established measurement invariance between adolescents and young adults. Overall, the 16-item Civic Agency Measure consistently demonstrated validity and reliability. We discuss the utility of our work for advancing sociopolitical development theory and supporting adolescents' efforts for social change.

We surveyed young people in the two weeks following the 2024 election to take their pulse on the current state of U.S. politics. This research brief charts the most frequent terms youth use to describe politics today, highlighting their overall dissatisfaction and political gloom.

As part of the developmental stage of emerging adulthood, youth may cultivate critical consciousness (CC) to transform oppressive systems. CC development may be influenced by discriminatory experiences and may affect well-being. To better understand longitudinal CC development and its relationship to discrimination and well-being (i.e., perceived stress, anxiety, hopefulness), we studied a U.S. national longitudinal cohort of emerging adult college students between the ages of 18 and 22 at baseline (M_age = 20.0, SD = 1.3) who completed four surveys between April 2020 and July 2021 (N = 684). The analytic sample was 63% women and 37% men (gender-diverse participants were removed due to small sample size) and 26% lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer/questioning, and other minoritized sexual identities. Self-identified race/ethnicity backgrounds were 54% white, 20% Asian/Pacific Islander, 9% Latinx, 5% Black, and 10% multiple races/ethnicities and/or as Middle Eastern/North African. We conducted latent profile transition analysis and identified five patterns of CC development, with a minority of participants in two "growth" transition patterns wherein they increased their CC over time. Maintaining higher levels of CC, and especially developing CC, was associated with more prior experiences with discrimination and with concurrent and subsequent higher levels of perceived stress and anxiety. We recommend institutions of higher education and college-based organizations to build well-being practices and structures into CC-raising spaces to support empowering CC development amid ongoing sociopolitical turmoil. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).