Transforming Footprints: A Resilience and Trauma Training Program by LAB-CO in collaboration with the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), as part of the project “Resilience and Trauma Training for Central American Youth Leaders”. The goal is to strengthen the resilience and socio-emotional skills of young leaders in the region, helping them mitigate and prevent negative mental health effects caused by exposure to trauma (situations of violence at individual and social levels), through the reinforcement of both personal and community protective factors.
In its first edition in 2024, the program reached 40 young leaders from El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala, who were actively participating in peacebuilding initiatives. During the three sessions, the group of participants noted that the training they received contributed not only to their personal improvement but also to their family and work environments. On one hand, the training facilitated a significant review of their life situation concerning potential trauma experiences, resulting from growing up and leading in adverse contexts. On the other hand, they pointed out that the program provided them with practical resilience tools related to self-care and socio-emotional management, as well as for building and sustaining support networks.
To design a training program that appropriately addressed the needs of the target population, a diagnostic process was carried out, interviewing young leaders from the three implementation countries. This diagnosis confirmed that youth in the Northern Triangle of Central America live in adverse social contexts, characterized by violence and social inequality, leading to emotional deficiencies, broken social bonds, transmission of traumatic sequelae, and lack of access to development opportunities.
The implementation of the program evidenced that being young in Central America is a huge challenge, especially when taking on a leadership role in an organization or community. Numerous risks affect them, particularly those related to mental health, the multiple demands of being a young leader, and exposure to potentially traumatic and high-stress situations. This leads to evident impacts such as emotional burnout, experiences of helplessness, and social disconnection. These are compounded by the absence of socio-emotional and mental health tools, support, and the feeling of having a support network.
Another fundamental aspect explored with the young leaders and key stakeholders interviewed were the psychosocial factors protecting mental health. In this regard, they were asked which factors they considered necessary to enhance in youth playing a leadership role, which are synthesized into three groups: self-awareness, facilitation of social bonding, and psychological management strategies. The training was designed based on these three axes.
To ensure that the training truly met its objectives, it underwent an iterative evaluation process. After each implementation, participants were asked to fill out an evaluation questionnaire, which, along with field notes from the LAB-CO and USIP technical team, served as inputs to articulate improvements in the curriculum.
The final curriculum is based on three evaluation processes and the feedback provided by the interviewed participants after implementation. This methodology allowed LAB-CO to fulfill one of its work pillars, promoting experiential and experimental learning in short trial cycles, combined with phases of reflection and feedback, to achieve sustainable solutions with technical robustness and contextual relevance, in collaboration with the users.
In its final version, the training consists of four modules that address different themes framed within the previously mentioned axes. These themes include: self-awareness, primary and secondary trauma, emotional management, self-care, and building support networks.
Transforming Footprints not only addresses an urgent local need but also represents an innovative and unique training proposal in the region. This is the result of two key processes. Firstly, the generation of evidence through diagnostic research and, secondly, an iterative creation methodology, which was strengthened by a quantitative evaluation, using a pre and post-implementation measurement instrument, and a qualitative evaluation through interviews and evaluation surveys.
The training has great potential to be replicated in multiple contexts and with various youth groups, where there is a clear need to implement such initiatives. The ultimate goal of this training is to promote psychosocial well-being and prevent the reproduction of potential cycles of social violence, leading to peacebuilding in the region.