Young Leaders for Civic Change

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, by 2050, Black and Latino/a/x/e people will comprise almost 40% of the United States population. Despite this projection and heightened awareness in recent years around racism’s deep roots, racial disparities persist in practically all aspects of American life. Slow change is due partially to lack of intention and lack of inclusion of the individuals often at the heart of this discourse–Black and Brown youth. Creative Reaction Lab (CRXLAB) recognizes that Black and Brown youth experience better life outcomes when they have agency in designing systems that work for them, and that the designing of these systems begins and ends with civic engagement. 

The National Civic League reports that communities with a strong culture of civic engagement and community decision-making have a higher quality of life. Unfortunately, due to a long history of systemic exclusion from democratic processes and power-building, the comparison communities are typically Black and Latino/a/x/e. National research from Black Girls Vote, the Latino Civic Health Index, and other sources shows that Black and Latino/a/x/e populations are significantly less likely than their white counterparts to vote in local elections and participate in non-electoral activities like attending school board meetings. Within CRXLAB’s own backyard, St. Louis City’s Civic Engagement Equity Indicator reveals that residents in majority-white wards are 30% more likely to vote than residents in majority-Black wards. The effects of racial disparities in civic engagement are far-reaching, and seeds are planted early. A 2018 Society for Research and Child Development study found that civic engagement in adolescence is positively associated with income and education outcomes later in life–social determinants of health in which Black and Latino/a/x/e communities have historically lagged. 

Black and Brown youth voices too often are erased from discussions around social justice, community development, and civic engagement. Black and Latino/a/x/e communities historically and contemporarily have experienced disproportionate levels of underinvestment and disinvestment in education, civic engagement, healthcare, and environmental justice, and the COVID-19 pandemic only exacerbated issues. Many Black and Brown young people want to improve outcomes for themselves and their communities, but they feel excluded from opportunities to amplify their individual and collective power. These youth bring value as living experts with intimate proximity to community problems and possible interventions. Centering them as designers and civically engaged problem solvers elevates their human rights and well-being, and the well-being of their communities. 

Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) is a CRXLAB enrichment program that prepares Black and Latino/a/x/e youth (26 years old and younger) with the skills to redesign unjust systems and build inclusive communities. The program leverages CRXLAB’s award-winning Equity-Centered Community Design™ (ECCD) creative problem-solving framework to teach youth participants the fundamentals of ECCD™ , preparing them to develop solutions unique to their communities. 

ECCD™ is a creative problem solving process based on equity, humility-building, integrating history and healing practices, addressing power dynamics, and co-creating with the community. This design process focuses on a community’s unique culture and needs, equipping participants with the tools to dismantle systemic oppression and create a future with equity for all. YLCC participants will use the ECCD process to co-create approaches to address various inequities in collaboration with community stakeholders like local activists and public officials. Young leaders will identify power dynamics that perpetuate inequities and co-create transformative interventions that support racial equity. 

Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) invites young people to think critically about solutions to social issues impacting Black and Brown communities. Piloted in 2019, YLCC brought youth together first in the Colorado communities of Aurora/Metro Denver and then in St. Louis at the Deaconess Foundation. These youth participants focused on food apartheid (Denver) and gun violence (St. Louis) and launched their own interventions ranging from youth therapy clubs and pop-up cooking experiences to media campaigns and gun lock programs. 

Relaunching in During the 2023-24 cycle, YLCC will be designed for scale using a combination of our online learning platform and in-person interactive immersive experiences. In partnership with community-embedded and -trusted youth serving organizations, CRXLAB will go to youth where they are, embedding in local communities and co-creating hyper-local solutions in collaboration with local teachers, students, and community members. Within each YLCC immersive experience, students will learn the fundamentals of ECCD, develop solutions unique to their communities, and take a step in preparing for their academic future. The 2023-24 cohort seeks to engage a total of 80-120 youth. While there is a focus on St. Louis-based youth, YLCC will also be open to youth nationally.

YLCC programming is offered online over the course of one month free of charge to participants to ensure accessibility to a larger number of youth accustomed to virtual learning. Following each program, alumni graduation packages are distributed to participants, and alumni complete video testimonials. Cohorts of 20-30 students will be held quarterly during the program year.  

YLCC youth will have access to an online learning community through the Mighty Networks platform. The online learning community is facilitated and moderated by CRXLAB staff and will include learning modules, lessons, resource sharing, community building and live learning sessions. Youth will be able to engage and learn from other participants as well as through CRXLAB hosted sessions. CRXLAB has used the Mighty Networks platform for other youth programming and has found it enables greater community building, space for reflection and growth across geographic areas. 

CRXLAB’s leadership continues to explore new approaches to ensure participants receive culturally relevant content and opportunities to build community and grow connections.

Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) engages young people who are up to 26 years old and identify as Black and/or Latino/a/x/e. CRXLAB targets historically underrepresented youth who may be formerly incarcerated, LGBTQ-identifying, neurodivergent, or have a disability. While the program will have a national reach, there will be a geographic focus on young people from  communities within the St. Louis Promise Zone (an area of St. Louis City and County where the federal government partners with local stakeholders to improve economic growth and educational opportunities, and to address other community priorities.) 

Past YLCC cohorts have identified with the following demographics: ages ranged from 13 to 26; 68.3% Black, 7.3% Latino/a/e/x. YLCC has engaged youth in Denver, Colorado and in St. Louis, Missouri. Regardless of  geographic location, YLCC youth have all shared the common experience of feeling powerless, aware of social injustice within their community, but simply existing within it, devoid of any agency to act upon it.  YLCC exists to help Black and Latino/a/x/e youth identify and explore their innate power and creativity, harnessing their strengths to convert awareness to action. 

Utilizing culturally relevant, engaging, and accessible virtual programming, YLCC is designed using participant input. In the most recent YLCC cohort, curricular activities were adjusted during the program period due to feedback from the participants that was valued and heeded. 

YLCC offers its participants resources, training, and social capital needed to build community, grow personal and professional connections and achieve their social justice goals. CRXLAB stokes the excitement of young people to be civically engaged, equipping them with the tools needed to be engaged meaningfully and in spaces where they have been historically underrepresented.

Creative Reaction Lab (CRXLAB) is one of the pioneers of the new field of Equity Design, born out of necessity and in response to the systemic racism and community suppression that precipitated the 2014 murder of Michael Brown Jr. in Ferguson, Missouri. A former resident of Ferguson, Antionette Carroll, CRXLAB’s visionary Founder, President, and CEO, has spearheaded the innovation and growth of the organization. She exists at the intersection of many identities. She is a Black woman, skilled designer, fierce Redesigner for Justice, loving partner, proud mother, bold fashionista, serial social entrepreneur, and a champion for equity in all aspects of life. Her tireless work is driven by acknowledgement of her identities and her commitment to educating and mobilizing Black and Latino/a/x/e youth to challenge the racial and health inequities impacting our communities.

Under Antionette’s leadership, CRXLAB has built an international, multiracial, and multigenerational movement of Redesigners for JusticeTM; we have led youth programming; launched an award-winning framework called Equity-Centered Community DesignTM (garnering over 840k global impressions and counting); led equity-centered learning engagements with over 150 companies; and co-led the new Equity Design field of practice. Impassioned by decades of collective lived and professional experience, Antionette and the CRXLAB team are more than qualified to deliver this solution. They have a shared understanding of the cultural and social contexts in which their youth participants live. They have traveled similar paths, and have risen above structural barriers to amplify their own voices, and seek to help YLCC youth to do the same. Intimately aware of issues of social injustice, CRXLAB leaders have been steeped in this work from the start, and they know what is possible when folks, and especially young people, are supported in facing injustice head-on. 

Despite shared cultural experiences, CRXLAB’s leaders never assume that they know what is best for or what will interest program participants. Each program year, YLCC is customized in alignment with the feedback and creative outputs of participating youth. Cohort members are asked specific questions about youth voice and equity, and are engaged in dialogue and community exploration that reflect their responses.  By engaging the youth in intensive dialogue, CRXLAB’s team is afforded an intimate look into the minds, hearts, and dreams of Black and Brown youth who all share the desire to be seen, heard, and respected as they explore solutions to societal issues that have impacted the communities in which the live, learn, work, and play.

Creative Reaction Lab (CRXLAB) is applying to MIT Solve because we need strong partners who are serious about nurturing and helping to grow the racial equity and justice leaders of tomorrow. Since launching in 2014 as a result of the Ferguson Uprising, CRXLAB received a groundswell of support and global attention. Despite its growth and opportunities to reach diverse audiences around the globe, CRXLAB has witnessed a shrinking pool of sincere anti-racist partners and allies who are committed to engaging in the work of shifting social justice outcomes over the long term.  This discovery has created barriers in CRXLAB’s ability to sustain certain strategies intended to create more equitable conditions for diverse communities in years to come. Similarly, the tendency of philanthropy to shift its priorities has been challenging, and was only worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic as many funders and community partners pivoted to focus on traditional basic needs programming instead of more innovative initiatives that address the root causes of our nation’s social ills.

It is our foundational belief that, as are all systems within our society, systems of oppression, inequality, and inequity are by design; therefore, they can and must be redesigned. Black and Latino/a/x/e communities face disproportionate racial and health inequities that limit social, economic, and cultural growth. While Black and Latino/a/x/e youth want to improve well-being for themselves and their families, friends, communities, and culture, they currently feel unheard, unsupported, or excluded from opportunities to amplify their power and work toward liberation.

At Creative Reaction Lab, we believe that if we equip Black and Brown youth with consciousness, community, and power, then they will have the capacity to design interventions that will dismantle existing racial and health inequities; thus co-creating a society that embraces the humanity, rights, and power of Black and Latinx people. We are in search of more partners like MIT Solve who have exhibited a vested interest in and commitment to this work. 

We know, and research confirms, that youth from marginalized communities are rarely granted access to the resources, services, and experiences that they deserve to create a solid foundation for success as they enter adulthood. This is especially true with regard to education, and subsequently, exposure to civic education. In under-resourced schools, Black and Brown youth lack opportunities to engage in traditional democratic processes or civic simulations like debate club, mock trial, or well-designed service learning programs. While youth participation in these age-old programs has been associated with increased civic engagement into adulthood, they should not necessarily be the bar set for all youth, particularly those who come from historically marginalized groups. In short, stale programming that ignores historical and cultural contexts  may lack resonance and relevance for youth who are accustomed to tapping into their creativity, community, and culture to survive and thrive. 

Enter CRXLAB’s Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC).  YLCC uses technology and the award-winning Equity-Centered Community Design™ framework to help bridge the gap that these young people have experienced in their educational and civic engagement journeys. CRXLAB’s Equity-Centered Community Design™ (ECCD) is a unique creative problem-solving process based on equity, humility-building, integrating history & healing practices, addressing power dynamics, & co-creating with communities. By exploring communities through the lens of reckoning and identifying our nation’s broken systems rooted in white supremacy, ECCD™ helps communities gain tools to dismantle systemic oppression & create solutions for an equitable future for all. Built upon this framework, YLCC addresses the disparities in effective youth civic engagement for Black and Brown youth by centering and uplifting their voices and promoting their developed solutions as a means of enacting social justice and change. Youth who might have had past experiences with being forced to temper their talents or mute themselves are instead taught to celebrate and amplify their strengths as they learn to engage others in effective social justice discourse using the platforms of their choice. They are then given further agency by deciding when and how to leverage their newfound skills for community education, engagement, and advocacy. 

In addition to providing access to accessible training and social capital, YLCC youth are also provided financial resources in the form of a team budget to spend on materials to prototype their solutions as well as a generous participation stipend. In past cohorts, participants were able to spend up to $6,000 on their team prototype, and individual youth each received $1,500 upon program completion. The allocation of these resources further communicates to young people that their time, ideas, and voice have value. The positive effects of YLCC ripple out far beyond the end of the program. YLCC alumni go on to join a growing community of dynamic Black and Latino/a/x/e leaders who are equipped with the skills to explore and design innovative, equity-focused  solutions to community-based problems. Eventually, these young people will go on to lead in all facets of society, prepared to continue to implement YLCC and ECCD™ concepts and learnings in new contexts that will impact even larger swaths of our community. 

CRXLAB’s Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) curriculum is designed to 1) build creative confidence, 2) inspire collective community mobilization, 3) improve the cultural and racially historical competency, personal humility, and civic leadership (knowledge and opportunities) of participants, and 4) promote youth as creative makers and civic leaders in ways that amplify youth voices and experiences concerning the civic life of one’s community. YLCC offers Black and Latino/a/x/e youth creative confidence and clear pathways to leverage their artwork for community organizing purposes. This program fosters a community and collective mobilization for increased consciousness around context, history, and power surrounding race and ethnicity in the U.S.

YLCC’s long-term goal is to build a vibrant network of Black and Latino/a/x/e young leaders who are designing innovative, equity-centered solutions to real-world problems. CRXLAB is educating participants on the importance of narrative change and civic engagement through design and equipping them with the tools to affect social change in their communities. Doing so provides their community members with an increased awareness of the issues.

Through the YLCC program, CRXLAB staff will continue to engage a growing network of young professionals who are skilled in the Equity-Centered Community DesignTM  creative problem solving framework and can integrate this technical training into future personal and professional development opportunities. Through participation in this program, these young leaders are exemplifying the value of innovative thinking as a vital seed for social impact to take root in our communities. 

CRXLAB evaluates community impact via metrics embedded in CRXLAB’s Theory of Change. The Theory of Changes states that all systems within our society, systems of oppression, advantage, inequality, and inequity are by design; therefore, they can and must be redesigned. YLCC programming succeeds when youth 1) develop conscious awareness of their relationship to the history and power dynamics of race and ethnicity in the United States, 2) feel empowered to build community with one another through cohort-style programs and a vibrant alumni network, 3) are equipped with the tools to access power in their work, and 4) receive opportunities that amplify their voices as creatives and civic leaders. CRXLAB centers cultural healing and safety as foundational elements of our curriculum. 

CRXLAB evaluates programmatic impact through quantitative and qualitative participant feedback. Participants consistently report that they feel more prepared for future academic and professional opportunities after engaging with CRXLAB programs. Alumni have reported enhanced creative confidence, individual feelings of belonging and safety with other participants and CRXLAB staff, deeper knowledge of professional pathways available to them, and a richer understanding of racial, ethnic, and cultural bias and privilege in their communities. 

Collecting participant data is a crucial capacity-building element of staff’s work. Staff members schedule regular feedback checkpoints with participants, and these check-ins are built into convenings and coaching/support sessions. Additionally, CRXLAB staff survey YLCC alumni to learn about their continued activities with regard to advocacy and leadership roles taken on at school and/or in the community.  CRXLAB is further codifying its data collection and process improvement methods. 

At Creative Reaction Lab, we acknowledge that youth historically have been undervalued as architects of change and culture. We believe that if we equip Black and Latino/a/x/e youth with:

1.  training and tools to build consciousness* around context, history, and power surrounding race and ethnicity in the United States;

2.  a community for cultural healing, safety, and collective mobilization; and

3.  access to traditional power through institutions, funding, and resources;

then they will have the capacity to design interventions that will dismantle existing racial and health inequities; thus co-creating a society that embraces the humanity, rights, and power of Black and Latinx people. 

We define consciousness as deep awareness of one's own thoughts and of the society in which one lives, allowing for critical analysis of the prevailing narratives one sees and experiences.

The 2019 cohorts of the Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) program bore evidence of CRXLAB’s theory of change.  As a result of the YLCC program, surveyed program participants stated they would on average be more likely to get civically and socially involved in their local community (4.35 out of 5), invite diverse co-creators into their work (4.39 out of 5), and collaborate with people different from themselves to develop approaches to activate their local community (4.44 of 5). They also reported on average to be more likely to explore the history and power dynamics of situations when developing approaches (4.43 of 5), reflect on identity and power (themselves and others) in various spaces (4.49 of 5), and incorporate Equity-Centered Community Design into their work (4.39 of 5). Furthermore, 73.9% of participants indicated an increase in frequency of thinking about personal identity and power in a month after YLCC.

The Youth Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) program model is built upon a  technological foundation, existing as a result of leveraging the power of the Internet. The program is offered online utilizing web conferencing technology (i.e. Zoom), engaging youth from across the nation in virtual educational opportunities through webinars, workshops, and social community through the Mighty Networks platform. With the funding provided from MIT Solve, we will scale the technology we use across the program, utilizing Mighty Networks to its full capacity. We are proposing to create a youth community of practice in which the participants would be able to foster connections, create dialogue, and continue their equity journey after completing the program. We prototyped the adult version of this offering last year. In that version, community members have weekly events where they can commune with each other and also bring issues to the group that we help to combat through an equity design lens.

CRXLAB programs are guided by the belief that all systems within our society, systems of oppression, inequality, and inequity are by design; therefore, they can and must be redesigned. CRXLAB believes that equipping Black and Latinx/e youth with 1) consciousness, 2) community, and 3) power, will empower them to design interventions that dismantle existing racial and health inequities; thus co-creating a society that embraces the humanity, rights, and power of Black and Latinx people.

CRXLAB places a strong emphasis on internal DEI efforts, further positioning the organization to co-create with program participants and advance racial equity. CRXLAB’s Board and staff leadership represents our communities of focus, including but not limited to lived experience, race/ethnicity, gender identity, class, and ability status. CRXLAB not only invites individuals with salient lived experience to the table, we build it around them and seat them at the head, with the understanding that it is their viewpoints, opinions, and experiences that matter in a design context.

CRXLAB’s Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) is committed to diverse participant representation and plans to engage a larger number of young leaders each year. Expanded constituency will expose youth to a growing network of young people and stakeholders advocating for equity issues. An example of this sort of network-building was seen in CRXLAB’s Adobe Max 2022 partnership. Youth artwork from CRXLAB’s Art for Equity Campaign was displayed with name recognition in front of 30,000+ viewers, and CRXLAB staff facilitated networking opportunities between youth and professional artists. These opportunities blossomed into avenues of professional exposure and potential collaboration. 

The Young Leaders for Civic Change (YLCC) program has two key customer groups: (1) the youth people who participate and learn to use advocacy skills, and (2) the community members, inclusive of public officials, who are engaged by the youth and impacted through increased awareness of the issues broached. YLCC participants receive coaching and instruction on CRXLAB’s award-winning Equity-Centered Community Design™ (ECCD) creative problem-solving framework, and then go on to develop their own projects and interventions. 

Beyond the tens of young people who are direct beneficiaries upon joining each cohort of YLCC, many more have been touched by the program through the dynamism of the solutions that they initiate. Since inception , 30 young people have completed the YLCC program, and as a result 30 interventions ranging from youth therapy clubs to media campaigns have been launched. 

CRXLAB leverages staff, board, partnerships, and alumni professional networks to sustain the program and expand its reach into new audiences. CRXLAB brokered a partnership with the Contemporary Art Museum (CAM) Saint Louis in 2020 with their new venture, Collective Impact. This “Collective” cohort of ten residents and stakeholders based in CAM and CRXLAB’s immediate neighborhoods identify needs and topics of interest and then determine a public art project (sculpture/installation, mural, social practice, etc.) that can best address those needs. Results are shared with the broader public in the form of an exhibition and program at CAM. 

Program staffing is robust and on track to grow as the program expands. Currently YLCC is managed by a Program Coordinator with support from a Summer Associate and a fellow. CRXLAB will hire a Program Director in FY24.  There will also be assistance from a Chief Operating Officer and a People Engagement and Impact Director. 

YLCC programming is offered in online free of cost to participants to ensure accessibility to a larger number of youth accustomed to virtual learning. CRXLAB embraces developing culturally relevant, engaging, and accessible virtual programming for youth. Leadership continues to explore new approaches to ensure participants receive opportunities to build community and grow personal and professional connections.

Our Board is composed of leaders from corporate, nonprofit, and government sectors who are actively engaging their networks to market YLCC. CRXLAB’s leader Antionette Carroll has participated in multiple cohort and leadership programs, and champions YLCC through her numerous recognitions and awards for her work including being named an Aspen Institute Civil Society Fellow, Roddenberry Fellow, Echoing Green Global Fellow, TED Fellow, ADCOLOR Innovator, SXSW Community Service Honoree, Camelback Ventures Fellow, and Essence Magazine Woke 100. This exposure has extended to media as well - she was featured in Empathy for Change by Amy J. Wilson, Fast Company Innovation by Design: Creative Ideas That Transform the Way We Live and Work by Stephanie Mehta, and Beloved Economies: Transforming How We Work by Jess Rimington and Joanna L. Cea.

CRXLAB has been proud to include the following funding partners as past supporters of YLCC:Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Deaconess Foundation, St. Louis Economic Development Corp, and Recast through St. Louis County. We are hopeful about including new partners like MIT Solve among this year's supporters.