Examining Relational Empowerment for Elementary School Students in a yPAR Program

Abstract This paper joins relational empowerment, youth empowerment, and Bridging Multiple Worlds frameworks to examine forms of relational empowerment for children in two intermediary institutions—school and a youth participatory action research after‐school program (yPAR ASP). Participants were twelve children, most of whom were Latina/o and from im/migrant families, enrolled in a yPAR ASP for 2 years. A mixed‐method approach was utilized; we analyzed children's interviews, self‐defined goals, and their social networks to examine their experiences of relational empowerment. We conclude that children experienced each of the five relational empowerment factors—collaborative competence, bridging social divisions, facilitating others’ empowerment, mobilizing networks, and passing on a legacy—in the yPAR ASP setting, and some factors in school. These experiences, however, were more pronounced in the yPAR ASP setting. Additionally, social network analyses revealed that a small but meaningful percentage of actors bridged worlds, especially home and family, but by year 2, also school and the yPAR ASP. Finally, most helpers for school‐based goals came from school, but a sizable number came from family, friends, and home worlds, and by year 2, also came from the yPAR ASP. Implications range from theoretical to methodological development, including the use of social network analysis as a tool to descriptively examine relational power in context.