HEALTH INITIATIVES FOR YOUTH INC
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Mission Statement
HIFY is a multicultural organization whose mission is to improve the health and wellbeing of underserved young people through innovative youth leadership, popular education and advocacy, in pursuit of multi-level social change. Founded in 1992 during the height of the HIV/AIDS crisis to bring youth voices into the prevention dialogue, HIFY subsequently expanded its focus to address the broader context of wellness in the lives of young people and their available support networks, focusing our work through a youth development lens. HIFY prioritizes traditionally underserved youth, including lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and questioning (LGBTQIQ) youth, low-income youth, and youth of color.
About This Cause
Health Initiatives for Youth (HIFY) 2016 Profile The mission of Health Initiatives for Youth (HIFY) is to improve the health and well-being of underserved young people through innovative youth leadership, popular education, and advocacy in the pursuit of multi-level social change. HIFY was founded in 1992 by a team of committed health care and youth service professionals in response to the immediate need for HIV prevention, treatment, and care for young people in San Francisco. Today, HIFY continues to address HIV, safer sex, and substance use—but in broader Bay Area communities and through the lens of healthy youth development. Our job is to give young people the skills and information they need to make healthy decisions about their lives—particularly decisions about sexuality and reproductive health—to help them make a safe and healthy transition to adulthood. HIFY is widely respected throughout the Bay Area as a leading collaborative organization dedicated to improving youth health, and to enhancing the quality and scope of youth health and social service provision.HIFY predominantly serves low-income youth of color in San Francisco and Alameda Counties. HIFY has a 24-year history of developing innovative programs and resources that have transformed the local culture of youth health education. Our model for youth health workshops has been so successful that larger youth-serving organizations have gone on to hire their own health education staff and implement similar programs on a permanent basis. Currently, HIFY provides workshops to some of the most vulnerable youth in the Bay Area. Over the years, we have developed partnerships that enable us to reach youth in the juvenile justice system; re-entry, homeless, and foster youth; and LGBTQIQ youth. HIFY staff has an extensive history of training peer health educators in health topics and in facilitation skills. HIFY has also distributed thousands of copies of health education publications created by and for youth—including our acclaimed A Young Woman’s Survival Guide, which has gone through multiple editions;a Spanish-language young women’s guide developed with OMH support in a partnership with La Clinica de la Raza; and A Young Man’s Survival Guide, which was so popular that our supply was depleted within three months of its printing. HIFY regularly works with youth to create and share digital stories and other social media, using technology to bring youth health and wellness stories to their peers. HIFY has extensive experience participating in larger collaboratives and partnering with a range of health and youth-serving organizations and networks. For example: • For 10 years, HIFY spearheaded and administered the Ryan White (Title IV)-funded Project AHEAD, a collaboration of HIV testing services and agencies that provided an integrated system of service for HIV-positive youth in San Francisco. • HIFY was subcontracted with Mental Health Act funding to provide cultural competency training to behavioral health professionals in San Francisco regarding both transition-age youth and LGBTQ populations. • HIFY worked to create youth health clinics at Lincoln and Washington High Schools. HIFY currently trains Youth Outreach Workers (YOWs) for the San Francisco Unified School District, and collaborates with school-based Wellness Centers. • HIFY took a lead role in the collaborative that created Dimensions Clinic, the only clinic specifically for LGBTQ youth in San Francisco. HIFY is the fiscal agent for this Clinic and HIFY’s executive director serves on its board. • HIFY has participated actively the in San Francisco Adolescent Health Working Group (AHWG), which successfully pushed the San Francisco Department of Public Health (SFDPH) to establishan office of Adolescent Health and work with the San Francisco Unified School District to develop its new health education curriculum that is now being implemented in high schools. • HIFY has received grants from the CDC, SAMHSA, Office of Minority Health for HIV prevention, sexual health education, and substance abuse prevention programs engaging youth in both Alameda and San Francisco Counties. In addition, HIFY collaborates with countless local and regional youth-serving organizations and agencies, and provides technical assistance, support, and training services that have had a direct impact on the quality of youth care and service in this region. HIFY offers trainings on youth and HIV, youth and substance use, working with LGBTQ youth, and health and youth development for providers in the San Francisco Bay Area. HIFY has extensive experience providing interventions comparable to those described in the present application. HIFY has demonstrated year over year, statistically significant improvement in participants’ substance abuse and HIV risk and strategy knowledge, awareness and behaviors, baseline to follow up. HIFY’s current programs include: • SKILL (Sharing Knowledge to Increase Leadership & Learning)–HIFY has adapted a nationally-recognized evidence-based curriculum (Street Smart) into a dynamic, locally-appropriate sexual health education and substance abuse prevention program and has developed partnerships so that we can deliver it to a broad array of underserved youth locally, including youth in traditional public schools, youth in alternative schools, and youth in community programs. In conjunction with this initiative we are offering a customizable 6-unit training of trainers to 75 youth-serving providers and teachers to build their capacity to support youth health; implementing a youth-driven social marketing strategy; and offering health education resource kits and basic training to 20 youth-serving organizations that do not specialize in health. • Health Education Programming at the Youth Guidance Center– HIFY is one of eight local organizations providing health education to more than 2,700 young people at San Francisco’s Youth Guidance Center. We specifically address topics including consent and negotiation, healthy relationships, pregnancy prevention and expectations, positive sexuality, and decision-making. We generally reach 300-500 youth each year. • Diversity Clubs and Safe Space for LGBT Youth in Oakland - HIFY delivers empowering programming at several underserved Oakland high schools, and helping to build an eco-system of resources in communities where these young people have largely been invisible and at greater risk of negative health and academic outcomes. Our programs include leadership development, empowerment, culture and arts workshops, and health education. • LGBT Allyship & Leadership for Middle Schools – Working with the SF Unified School District and the SF Department of Children, Youth & Their Families, HIFY has been bringing comprehensive programming to create safe and welcoming environments in San Francisco middle schools with the greatest need. This work is particularly important as LGBT youth “come out” at younger ages and middle school teachers and staff are often less prepared to prevent bullying and create inclusive classrooms.