Grant: Operating Grant: Pathways Implementation Research Team - Component 1

Youth have a largely untapped potential - and capacity - to be major players in community health promotion initiatives. This research will seek ways to involve Indigenous youth as agents of change for health and wellness in their own communities through involvement in proven and potential health promotion interventions. Doing so within each community's unique cultural context will foster empowered and more resilient youth, and result in enhanced overall community wellness. The primary goal of this research is to promote Indigenous youth resilience through increased confidence, capacity, leadership skills, and self-efficacy. It will use a community- and asset-based approach that emphasizes and promotes youth strengths. This will address the suicide prevention exemplar. The secondary goal is improved health decision-making by youth and other community members through direct engagement in health promotion programs and interventions, and the associated critical reflection on health behaviours. This will address the obesity/diabetes exemplar. This research is being conducted in partnership between an interdisciplinary group of academic researchers and four rural/urban Alberta First Nation (Frog Lake and Heart Lake First Nations) and Métis communities (Gunn Métis Local 55 and Métis Regional Council - Zone IV of the Métis Nation of Alberta). Potential interventions will be identified through a focused scoping exercise, community member interviews and discussions, and workshops to be conducted in each of the communities.