Jóvenes Sanos

JS is collaborating with NAMI to create a youth-created curriculum for teachers and student leaders to lead discussions and events around mental health. They plan to host a Youth Mental Health Summit in March.

JS is continuing its partnership with DataShare to share the story behind the data and is currently working on a survey to engage families.

JS youth are participating in monthly meetings with UCSC professors, grad students, undergrads, and other youth from the county, where they are planning to begin conducting a research project surrounding the topic of Youth Mental Health

​​​​​​​The “Healing Through Nature'' will be a series of 2 events in partnership with Living Evolution focused on increasing youth's positive cultural identity, connections to nature, and peers to promote healing.

The UCSC We Belong Project concluded with a community event held in Watsonville City plaza, where JS youth showcased their Photovoice projects!

JS collaborated with YAN and hosted a pop-up event on National Youth Day at the Watsonville Youth Center. The goal of this event was to connect youth with local resources and youth programs in order to teach them about stress-busting tools to increase their mental wellbeing as well as to provide them an opportunity to meet new people.

JS youth were able to take part in a 12-week program focused on promoting stress-busting tools and learning about nutrition, fitness, and mental wellness. Participating youth had the opportunity to apply for a scholarship funded by Envision Fitness at the end of the program.

JS youth participated in a leadership workshop led by Impact launch where they learned new designed tools and practiced speaking powerfully.

Jóvenes Sanos participated in the creation of a multilingual survey training to build capacity for creating surveys and analyzing data. The training will be shared with local community organizations.

We Belong is a community-initiated student-engaged research project that addresses these questions by documenting the experiences of immigrant families, their contributions, and the obstacles they face. We aim to elevate immigrant voices, strengthen local community coalitions, and generate actionable knowledge to improve social services and inform policies to ensure ALL community members belong and thrive.

UCSC interns mentor 8-10 Jóvenes Sanos youth and community college students, introducing them to community-based research and pathways to college, while Jóvenes Sanos youth provide guidance on community, youth, and public health issues as well as help with project outreach and recruitment.

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Jóvenes Sanos  created and led culturally relevant and engaging after-school peer-to-peer programming to promote various self-care and mindfulness strategies and help reduce stress among youth.

In May 2022, Jóvenes Sanos partnered with the Watsonville Library to host a week of awareness for Mental Health awareness month. Youth will create and lead  activities throughout the week and collaborate with NAMI Santa Cruz County to host an Ending the Silence workshop for families. 

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