May celebrates National Adolescent Health Month™, which emphasizes the importance of building on young people’s strengths and potential, encouraging meaningful youth engagement in adolescent health activities, and highlighting key topics in adolescent health. You can promote healthy behaviors and outcomes for adolescents by sharing social media messages with your networks; find sample messages, graphics, and resources on the Office of Population Affairs (OPA) website.
Adolescent health is a broad term that encompasses many aspects of health and well-being, including sexual and reproductive health, mental health, physical health, and the amount and type of care that young people access and receive. Youth-serving programs and organizations should offer resources, tools, and skills that empower adolescents to make informed decisions about their own health.
The resources below from the RHNTC can help youth-serving professionals, including those working in Teen Pregnancy Prevention (TPP) program settings, and family planning providers to support adolescent health and youth development.
For TPP Program Staff
Trauma-Informed Approach in Adolescent Health: Team Meeting Series
This series of team meeting packages can help you facilitate team conversations related to trauma and adverse childhood experiences and to explore ways programs and staff can incorporate trauma-informed approaches for all.
Inspire Change Through Social Media: A Toolkit for OPA TPP Grantees
This social media toolkit provides sample messages and graphics that Teen Pregnancy Prevention (TPP) Program grantees can use to communicate with young people. Also available in Spanish.
Digital Channels at a Glance: Best Practices for TPP Programs Job Aid
This job aid shares best practices and considerations for using the most common digital channels (i.e., social media, websites, email).
Engaging Diverse Community Partners Job Aid
This job aid job aid offers guidance on developing partnerships with community groups, programs, and organizations that represent various sectors and stakeholders that affect sexual and reproductive health.
Talking with Teens about Sex: Resources for Caregivers
This list of resources is designed to prepare caregivers to have conversations with their teens about sex and other sensitive topics. TPP programs should vet each resource before sharing it with caregivers to ensure it will be well-received.
The Healthy Relationship Wheel and Relationship Spectrum
This job aid can help youth-serving professionals to discuss characteristics of healthy relationships and encourage adolescents to consider the characteristics of their own relationships. Also available in Spanish.
Develop an Elevator Pitch to Engage Caregivers Job Aid
This job aid can help TPP program staff in developing an elevator pitch they can use to compel caregivers to engage in their program.
Engaging Parents and Caregivers in Programs For Teen Healthy Relationships and Sexual Health Tip Sheet
This tip sheet from OPA provides suggestions for how to engage parents, guardians, and caregivers in TPP programs.
Grantee Spotlights
Centering Youth Voice and Engagement at YMCA Louisville
In this grantee spotlight, learn how YMCA of Greater Louisville developed creative ways to expand youth engagement and elevate youth voices in its TPP20 Tier 1 project.
Using Participatory Research to Uncover Strategies for Meaningful Youth Engagement
In this grantee spotlight, learn how Youth Engagement Network (YEN)—a network formed by Education, Training and Research Associates, a TPP Tier 2 (TPP20) Innovation and Impact Network grantee—employed a participatory research method to help identify engagement strategies that resonate with youth.
TPP Program Grantee Tests Out Innovative Approaches
In this grantee spotlight, learn how Cabarrus Health Alliance, a TPP Tier 1 grantee, piloted novel approaches while implementing the Elevate program among high school students in North Carolina.
Implementing an Equitable Recruitment Process to Build a Diverse Partner Network
In this grantee spotlight, learn how Thrive, Inc., a TPP Tier 2 (TPP20) Innovation and Impact Network grantee, made their process for recruiting, reviewing, and contracting with new network partners more equitable.
For Family Planning Providers
Promoting Youth-Friendly Environments in Family Planning Clinics Webinar
This archived webinar introduces health care professionals to elements of an adolescent-centered environment, and outlines key staff and provider behaviors that are essential to providing youth-friendly care.
Providing Family Planning Services to Adolescents During Uncertain Times: Tips and Strategies
This job aid summarizes insights on how to adapt your family planning program’s services to meet young people’s emerging reproductive health needs during public health crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic.
Promoting Family Planning Services Social Media Toolkit
This social media toolkit provides sample graphics and messages that family planning sites can use to conduct outreach and to communicate with current and potential family planning clients. Content includes affirming and supportive health promotion messages that encourage clients to seek appropriate reproductive health services and take control of their reproductive well-being. Also available in Spanish.
Counseling Adolescent Clients to Encourage Family Participation Video
This 6-minute video shows how to provide counseling that encourages family participation in an adolescent client’s decision to seek family planning services.
Obesity, Insulin Resistance, and Prediabetes: Supporting Adolescents and Young Adults (Part 1) Webinar
This archived webinar focused on how family planning providers and TPP staff can support adolescents and young adults living with obesity, insulin resistance, and prediabetes.
Obesity, Insulin Resistance, and Prediabetes: How to Initiate Counseling for Adolescents and Young Adults (Part 2) Webinar
This archived webinar covered actionable tips and culturally competent strategies for family planning providers and TPP staff initiating counseling related to obesity and diabetes prevention during discussions of pregnancy prevention or planning.
Youth-Friendly Services Starter Guide Job Aid
This job aid from the Adolescent Health Initiative outlines strategies to create a welcoming, respectful, and accessible youth-friendly environment.
Grantee Spotlights
Leveraging School Partnerships to Innovate Family Planning Outreach and Education
In this grantee spotlight, learn how Commonwealth Healthcare Corporation, a Title X grantee in the Northern Mariana Islands, sustained outreach and education to adolescents and young adults by partnering with schools during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Providing Teen-Friendly Care in Montana
In this grantee spotlight, learn strategies for providing teen-friendly care from Flathead Family Planning, a Title X service site in Montana.
Youth Leaders Inform Adolescent-Responsive Family Planning Services
In this grantee spotlight, read how youth experts helped participants in the RHNTC’s Facilitating Youth Engagement in Title X Programs Peer Learning Group to strengthen both their relationships with adolescent clients and their Title X services overall.
