Native Youth Productions

Denver Colorado

Federal Economic Mobility Grant

From 2022 - 2025 we worked with The Denver Indian Family Center, the CO. Dept. of Human Services, and the Federal office of Child Support Services to build from the ground up a youth/agency partnership supported production company which culminated in a youth-led community-level film production and peer-targeted economic mobility digital campaign that’s reached tens of thousands of Native American Colorado youth.

FLYER FOR EXTRAS FOR POWWOW SHOOT

When we recruited participants, we offered youth an opportunity to make a film, to be a part of something, and to connect with peers. That was a lot more appealing than inviting them to participate in an economic mobility behavioral intervention.

The first implementation of the Native Youth Productions curriculum resulted in a small library of public-facing products. But the pilot’s outcomes were “beyond anything we could have hoped for.”

-DCSS program manager

Building rapport and trust with Native American youth to the degree they are willing to endorse government funded programs is an effort that’s understandably challenging.

Yet, these youth created content and a film that introduced many thousands of their peers to strategies for breaking the cycles of poverty that have held back Native Communities for hundreds of years.