Applications in Bridging the Gap: A Community-Campus Partnership to Address Sexual Health Disparities Among African-American Youth in the South

Abstract

Risky sexual behavior among African-American youth increases risks for sexually transmitted diseases and unintended pregnancy. This article describes a community-academic partnership to assess The 2 HYPE Abstinence Club, a program combining abstinence education with stress management and creative arts promotion for African-American youth ages 12-18. Bi-directional learning and communication systems were established to facilitate culturally relevant evaluation approaches, quality assurance in data collection, and action-based protocols for on-going improvement. Assessment tools included self-administered surveys and focus groups to gauge intervention effectiveness and perceptions regarding abstinence, sexual peer norms and intervention characteristics. Statistically significant increases in the understanding of abstinence benefits and sexual activity risks were observed and youth identified goal-setting and refusal skills as most important program components. Youth-instructor relationships and the integration of hip-hop were reasons cited for sustained participation. This assessment partnership represents a rapport with minority youth and a participatory evaluation approach adding programmatic and evidence-based value to intervention efforts.

A Review of Hip Hop-Based Interventions for Health Literacy, Health Behaviors, and Mental Health

“…This gap limits opportunities to develop, evaluate, and disseminate culturally sensitive treatments, such as hip hop-based interventions. Several studies provide specific guidelines to facilitate successful collaborations between community mental health agencies and university researchers [67, 68]. For instance, Abdul-Adil and colleagues [69] provided a detailed university-community partnership model and described results from a mutually beneficial collaboration between the Disruptive Behavior Clinic at the University of Illinois-Chicago and the Community Mental Health Council in Chicago to develop evidence-based practices for youth with disruptive behaviors.…”

Hip Hop as an Agent for Health and Wellbeing in Schools

“…Programs were primarily described as located in secondary/high schools (n = 11), yet several were also in reported in primary/elementary (n = 5), and junior high/middle school settings (n = 5). Of these, four were reported as being charter (Akintobi et al, 2011;Lamb & Randazzo, 2016;Romero, 2012) or special schools for students with behavioural issues (Olson-McBride & Page, 2012). Seven studies reported programs that were run in classroom settings, four in counselling settings within schools, and the rest were either after school programs, or a combination of school and community settings.…”

“…In US studies, participants were reported as being predominantly African American with several papers describing this as their main participant group (Akintobi et al, 2011;Gonzalez & Hayes, 2009;Hill, 2009;Lamb & Randazzo, 2016;Noble, Hedmann, & Williams, 2015;Olson-McBride & Page, 2012;Williams & Noble, 2008). Students of Latino or Hispanic background (including Mexican/Mexican-American; Romero, 2012) were the next most represented group, followed by white, 3 and Asian students.…”

“…Students of Latino or Hispanic background (including Mexican/Mexican-American; Romero, 2012) were the next most represented group, followed by white, 3 and Asian students. Other cultural backgrounds described included Native American (Akintobi et al, 2011), Pacific Islander and "mixed heritage" (Sussman et al, 1995). Tucker et al (1999) did not explicitly report the cultural backgrounds of their participant group, yet suggest in their introduction a focus on addressing issues related to "African American youths", while Levy, Emdin, and Adjapong (2017, p. 3) described their participant group as "urban youth of color" (p. 3).…”

The Health, Enlightenment, Awareness, and Living (HEAL) Intervention: Outcome of an HIV and Hepatitis B and C Risk Reduction Intervention

“…WSCI, a non-profit community-based organization located in Southwest Atlanta, Georgia, initiated a community-academic partnership with the Morehouse School of Medicine Prevention Research Center (MSM PRC), evaluators of the HEAL intervention [27]. MSM PRC evaluations have been designed to address needs mutually identified by the funder, grantees and target populations to assure that program activities (1) are audience-driven, (2) foster sustained ownership of data collection processes, (3) implement participatory processes, and (4) are perceived as central to program planning, implementation and sustainability.…”