Newark Opportunity Youth Network
Led by Newark youth, perspectives from 572 young people were gathered through more than 70 small-group conversations in every ward of the city, creating a shared body of insight on school disconnection and potential solutions.
Listen to a medley of voices from across conversations.
The conversation portal brings together two years of youth reflections and is now a resource young leaders are using to guide advocacy with education and community leaders.
Read the case study to learn more about how Cortico worked with Newark Opportunity Youth Network
Introduction:
The surge in chronic absenteeism has impacted school districts around the country, including in Newark, New Jersey, where over 30% of high school students are regularly absent. Chronic absenteeism—missing 10% or more of school days a year—has been linked to profound negative impacts on academic achievement, social development, and future outcomes. While alarming statistics on absenteeism are easy to find, examples of impactful interventions are few and far between. The partnership between Newark Opportunity Youth Network (NOYN) and Cortico seeks to address this issue by bringing youth experiences, knowledge, and voices to the forefront.
Challenge: Understanding Absenteeism and Disconnection
While the sustained rise of absenteeism is associated with the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the underlying causes of the issue are not well understood or captured. This is especially pressing in Newark, where the youth disconnection rate is 7.5% higher than the national average. For NOYN—a nonprofit dedicated to improving outcomes for New Jersey’s opportunity youth—the void of real youth perspectives within this discourse inspired an innovative, youth-led approach to more deeply understand the experiences, challenges, and ambitions of Newark’s youth.
Solution: A Youth-Led Conversation Campaign
NOYN, in partnership with Cortico, launched a youth-led conversation campaign to capture, analyze, and disseminate insights from small-group conversations with youth across Newark. This approach champions youth as experts of their own experiences, providing a channel for youth—who are often left at the crossroads of society’s system failures—to make their voices heard.
Process: Amplifying Voices and Building Skills
In 2024, Youth leaders from NOYN’s Youth Policy Advisory Board (YPAB) facilitated conversations with 170 Newark young people from across Newark, ages 14 to 24, on their experiences with education. Using Cortico’s tools and sensemaking process, over 30 recorded conversations were analyzed to reveal key insights about the unique challenges and aspirations of Newark’s young people. With youth leading every step of the way—from program design to conversation facilitation to data analysis—the process not only amplifies youth voice but also builds valuable skills in technology, leadership, and civic engagement.
“Working on this project for the past year has really helped me mature a lot. I was able not just to listen to the stories of other youth but also to help them feel comfortable and safe sharing their experiences and affirming that they are not alone.” – Kevin, YPAB
Results: Transforming Insights into Impact
This project launched a channel for youth to bravely share their stories, adding much-needed nuance to the public narrative around absenteeism and disconnection from school. Young people from YPAB are using insights, themes, and real youth voices from the resulting conversation portal to share recommendations with key leaders, amplifying the perspectives of their peers to influence future educational strategies.
In May 2024, NOYN youth presented the findings of this work at MIT Center for Constructive Communication’s annual symposium. To an audience of industry leaders in technology and civic engagement, they led a dynamic workshop demonstrating how integrating youth perspectives is crucial for addressing absenteeism and enhancing educational experiences. They also guided participants on listening more effectively to the youth in their communities.
In July of the same year, NOYN youth leaders also used their Youth Speak for Themselves portal to share insights on absenteeism and education reform with key stakeholders, including at Teach for America’s new teacher training.
2025 Update: Year 2 Findings
In Year 2 of the Newark Youth Voices Initiative, ten members of NOYN’s Youth Policy Advisory Board led conversations with 170 Newark youth to better understand why students feel disconnected from school. Young people shared that high school often isn’t preparing them for the future, noting limited exposure to career pathways and coursework that doesn’t reflect their aspirations. Youth researchers surfaced the core issues driving disconnection and developed a new set of recommendations for addressing these barriers.
Read the Year 2 report: Newark Youth Voices Initiative: Centering Youth Voice to Address Disconnection in Newark — Findings and Recommendations from Year 2
Visit the Youth Speak for Themselves portal. Explore the full two-year collection of 572 youth voices and 75 conversations in the Youth Speak for Themselves portal. The portal shares themes, stories, and insights from across all five wards of the city.
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