2013 Federation of Families for Children's Mental Health conference

Session: YouthMove West Virginia and their website

By Ladona Strouse

Key learning point: Youth Voice / Choice in creating the website

• It makes sense for the Youth and Family Members to assist in the creation / monitoring of the pieces of the SOC website that is pertinent to them.

Key learning point: Discussion of how the process occurred from after school meetings, to summer time programming to focus groups and then following up with online participation & development of their YouthMove chapter.

• This particular piece was very interesting as to how to develop / transform youth movement in Pennsylvania. I believe that we could utilize a great deal of their information and resources to assist in the furthering of their movement.

Key learning point: Blog type of thing embedded in their website

• They talked a great deal about how their blog operates in a similar manner to Facebook – which many are familiar with. They discussed at length how secure this is on their site in contrast to Facebook and how easy it is to hack into other people’s accounts.