%0 Thesis
%9 Master Essay
%A Gehr-Seloover, Alia
%D 2018
%F pittir:34213
%I University of Pittsburgh
%K SGM, youth, academic achivement, mental health, social ties, evaluation
%P 55
%T Leveraging SGM-youth serving organizations to enhance resiliency factors on academic achievement in sexual and gender minority youth
%U http://d-scholarship-dev.library.pitt.edu/34213/
%X Background: Sexual and gender minority (SGM) youth experience stigma and discrimination that can be damaging to their social wellbeing, mental health, and academic achievement. SGM-youth serving organizations provide SGM youth with a safe space to achieve social connection, mentorship, and vital resources they may not otherwise have access to. However, funding is often limited and SGM-youth serving organizations do not have the means to conduct rigorous evaluations to determine their impact. The purpose of this critical literature review is to (a) describe existing literature examining the disparities experienced by SGM-youth and approaches found to be beneficial on improving sexual and gender minority youths’ including social ties, emotional wellbeing, and academic achievement; and (b) identify measures and tools that can be used effectively to evaluate the effects of youth interventions. These findings will assist in ascertaining gaps in current public health literature, and will help in the development of an evaluative tool for SGM-youth serving organizations.   Method: A critical literature review was conducted in December 2017 using the PubMed database to identify peer-reviewed literature on current evaluative tools for SGM youth pertaining to social ties, emotional wellbeing, and academic achievement. Next, snowball citation sampling and a grey literature search were executed to search for other relevant articles and measures not detected in the initial PubMed literature search.   Results: Based on the critical literature review, 25 publications met eligibility criteria and their measurement tools were further analyzed to determine tools that could be effectively used by SGM-youth serving organizations; 7 measurement tools were recommended for use.  Conclusion: SGM-youth serving organizations provide SGM youth with much needed support and services. Practitioners working in SGM-youth serving organizations would benefit from a brief and easy to use assessment tool to evaluate their participants and programs, so as to ensure needs are being met. Data gained from use of these tools may also help nonprofits leverage funding for additional programming.