Timothy Kane: Final Relfection, Summer 2010

The four items I identified at the beginning of this class as barriers faced by teens toward a healthy sexuality included:
(1) Lack of communication and openness about sexuality leading to confusion and shame.
(2) Lack of role-models for sexual health, along with an omnipresent sexualized culture.
(3) High rates of childhood sexual abuse
(4) Impact of homophobia in relation to LGBTQ youth.

After participating in class discussions and interacting with and observing youth in class presentations, I have adjusted my thinking in a number of areas.

First, I gained personal knowledge of a variety of supportive venues through which youth can experience healthy, informative and open communication about sexuality. Specifically, I was impressed by the resource-rich environments of MetroTeen AIDS and Mary’s Center. Both venues offer youth diverse and staff-supported opportunities to ask questions about, learn information concerning and generally express freely their needs and wants regarding healthy sexuality. There also seem to be many peer-to-peer opportunities for youth to support each other, with the guidance and mentoring of professional staff.

Second, I did not witness first-hand the impact of homophobia as a barrier facing teens toward a healthy sexuality. The youth I engaged and observed seemed to be less impacted by homophobia than I originally projected. I did not engage or observe any LGBTQ-identified youth in the workshops, but again I was more impressed than not at the level of openness and awareness about LGBTQ issues expressed by the youth I did engage and observe in the workshops. There seems to exist much more acceptance and openness among DC youth about LGBTQ peers and issues than I had originally thought existed. Youth seemed to express supportive attitudes toward LGBTQ individuals or at least took a “live and let live” approach.

After engaging and observing the youth in our workshops, I still believe that youth lack role-models for sexual health and that they are vulnerable to an omnipresent sexualized culture. The youth at MetroTeen AIDS seemed especially burdened by the reality of modern-day DC sexual culture in that HIV is a major and common-place topic of discussion and concern. In addition, I heard comments from a number of youth in the workshops suggesting that they are familiar with childhood sexual abuse from personal experience. My sense is that childhood sexual abuse is a reality that some of the youth in the workshops are confronting. I am hopeful and grateful, however, that the youth have access to supportive and professional staff from schools and agencies to help them find their way to a healthy and happy future.

Finally, I have uncovered an entirely new and unanticipated learning outcome from my engagement with and observation of the youth in our workshops. I was impressed (almost stunned) at the amount of apparent learning that seemed to take place from our workshops in spite of all the distractions and “background noise” that seemed to be present. Somehow, the youth were able to identify, remember and repeat the salient points of the workshop topics, even when those points were not always expertly communicated within the workshops. I have concluded that I must never under-estimate the ability of youth to pick-up information from almost any source and that youth seem to be always listening even when they appear to tune-out the adults around them. What an impressive youth ability indeed...filled with tremendous potential for learning and growth!