ABOUT SAFER LATINOS

The proliferation of youth violence in the last few decades has fueled the publics fear and magnified possible misconceptions about youth gangs. To address the mounting concern about Latino youth violence in the D.C. metropolitan area, the LFGW, in collaboration with  member agency, Latin American Youth Center (LAYC),  and the George Washington University,  launched a  Youth Violence Prevention through Community Level Change initiative entitled SAFER Latinos.  Selected as one of two national programs to receive funding by Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in 2005, this comprehensive four year program targets Latino youth populations in Langley Park, Maryland, and addresses the Healthy People 2010 focus area of Injury and Violence Prevention,  a major leading federal health indicator for this decade. 

While research on youth violence and other risk behaviors has often acknowledged the role of community factors, most programs have shied away from addressing such issues and have focused more on interventions targeting specific risk factors in cohorts of individuals or families. Strategies for intervening at the community level are often complex, and the factors influencing violence at that level may have specific local, social and cultural characteristics. GWU-CLA-LAYCs research goal is to determine whether SAFER Latinos, a primary prevention program uniquely tailored to specific community-level mediating factors for Latino youth violence in the target community of Langley Park, MD can: positively impact those mediating factors, and if such positive impacts occur, reduce the incidence of violence by and among Latino youth as well as involvement in gangs (outcome).

It is anticipated that the implementation of the SAFER Latinos model for Langley Park, MD will result in the following impacts with respect to mediating factors for violence: increase self-ratings of family cohesion; increase perceived community support; for youth; decrease reliance on peer cohorts who share a sense of socio-cultural alienation; increase bonding to school by reducing the unfamiliarity with school culture and increasing the availability of appropriate school-based supportive services; increase the number of perceived life path options (future expectations); and decrease positive attitudes about violence. As a result of these changes in mediating factors, the following outcomes will result with respect to Latino youth: decrease in self-report involvement in violence and gangs; decrease in incidence of school and other violence.

As part of its work in this collaborative effort, the LFGW will be responsible for administering a community survey and conducting focus groups in those communities once a year for four years (starting in 2006). The door-to-door surveys, along with other data, will inform the proposed community intervention to modify factors related to youth violence.

Contact LFGW: 2437 15th Street NW, Washington DC 20009 - ph.202-328-9451