Presentations

Abstract

Background:

Hampton Roads and the Eastern Shore have the highest rates of teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in Virginia. Teen Health 360 Program at the EVMS Pediatrics Department has partnered with local schools and youth-serving organizations to pilot a comprehensive sex education intervention (CSE) among school-age youth since July 2020. Virtual classroom session delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic faced the challenge of decreased engagement from youth, parents, and the community. Thus, a crowdsourcing open call approach was implemented in 2022 to:

• Evaluate the effectiveness of the open-call strategy in engaging the youth and community
• Support teens as they learn about, build, and improve upon healthy relationships
• Create a safe space to empower teens to prevent and act against bullying, harassment, and violence.

An open call is a structured process of challenging individuals in a community to contribute creative knowledge and generate fresh perspectives to improve public health through a contest. Although the approach has proven effective in developing interventions and facilitating consensus in public health programming, less is known about using open calls to facilitate community engagement in teen pregnancy prevention interventions.

Methods:

Various in-person and virtual platforms were used to promote the open call. Submissions were collected online for 20 weeks in May/September 2022 and evaluated by a group of 40 independent judges representing diverse sub-populations. The judging process used a 10-point Likert scale and a standard set of judging criteria, including the relevance to the open call theme and youth, innovation, inclusivity, feasibility for program use, and overall quality. Submissions were quantitatively and qualitatively analyzed to summarize the characteristics and emergent themes about healthy relationship for teens. 32 submissions were identified for awards, receiving prizes of $200, $100, and $50, respectively, and their submissions have been publicly announced and disseminated through various channels (including website, social media, and community- based exhibitions) to generate dialogue about healthy relationships for teens.

Results:

We received 102 submissions (mean score: 41.83, Range: 27.71-54.71) among which 75% were from middle school and high-school aged students. A diverse demographic was captured across locations and occupations. Women/Girl (44%) and Man/Boy (45%) gender identities were nearly equally represented. Transgender and non-binary populations were also well represented (7% total) when compared to the national population estimate of 5.1%. While White, African American, and Asian communities were well represented, a gap in engagement with Hispanic and Latinx community was identified. Analysis of submission media (written, audio/visual) revealed a trend advancing age and preferred media of communication - 60% of 10-14 year olds used A/V mediums for self-expression, whereas only 40% of adults used A/V components in their submission. 14-18 year olds were nearly evenly split with a slight (55%) preference of A/V media. Thematic analysis of submissions revealed a large focus on: 1) the importance of relationship with self; 2) the importance of communication and support from caring adults; 3) boundaries, shared values, identification of red flags, and 4) effectiveness of social media platforms when engaging teens in information sharing and health communication.

Conclusions:

On the whole, open call is an effective educational engagement strategy to empower teens to nurture healthy relationships and take charge of their health and wellbeing. A wide-cast crowdsourcing strategy can increase diversity in location and ethnicity of participants, and accepting a variety of mediums of submission may increase diversity in ages of participants. A strategy to increase engagement in the Latinx populations must be considered -- perhaps delivering the CSE in Spanish could prove beneficial in closing the gap. The use of social media can bolster engagement from teens and community members in information sharing and health communication.