Youth Wellness Team Member Highlight and Q&A:
This month the Youth Wellness Team member highlight features Jayvyn (he/him). Jayvyn is a Senior at Middleton High School and plans to major in Social Work in college. Career goals for Jayvyn inlcude becoming a Counselor or Therapist.
Q&A with Jayvyn:
What is one thing you’d like for our Local/Tribal Health Departments to know about working with young people?
Youth really want to be involved in their own healthcare and helping other youth be involved in their healthcare. Taking those first steps to get youth engaged - but it can be really simple things like getting in contact with schools, talking with youth to see what they think and know about their local and Tribal health departments. Engagement can build up into doing bigger things.
What has the Youth Wellness Team been working on?
How to get youth voices involved in healthcare, specifically in local and tribal health communities. Getting local and tribal health departments to give better and more adequate care towards youth, and in a broader sense - the entire state.
What has been your favorite part of being on this team?
Being able to meet different people across Wisconsin. Being in the Madison area it’s one of the most condensed parts of Wisconsin (apart from Milwaukee), the mindset between people is different (not in a bad way!) and you see Wisconsin itself differently because it’s different from Madison. It’s been really interesting meeting and working with those people.
What are you personally interested in studying?
I’m really interested in social work. I want to work with the Madison community specifically because that’s where I grew up. I was surrounded by substance abuse and not healthy environments for a kid to be around, and I want to help people struggling with those things and lift them up.
