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This community research project explored neighborhood resources and supportive people, places and tools identified by adolescents and key community organizations in the Southbridge community of Wilmington, Delaware. Researchers collaborated with Southbridge community groups, Nemours Health and Prevention Services, and Christiana Care’s Department of Family and Community Medicine.

Improving our understanding of how adolescents see and use neighborhood resources has the potential to help discover ways for health providers, parents, teachers, youth-dedicated community organizations, and other stakeholders to improve the management of obesity, other health-related challenges. Resources identified by youth are also an important source of information and support for their academic success, job opportunities, and improving their safety within their community.

We collected information through focus groups and surveys with youth, and interviews with community members. The results identified gaps between available supports and identified challenges observed by youth and community organizations related to health, education, safety, economic development, as well as family and community networks. These findings offer opportunities to understand how residents navigate their community and to better support youth and communities from the perspective of youth living in Wilmington, Delaware.

In the following pages, youth participating in the PhotoVoice component of the project put together quotes and pictures they took to express how they feel about what are assets and barriers to success in their life.

Message to the community:

This is our Call to Action, please take time to review this photobook that our young

people have prepared and see how they view our community. Start to think of ways we

can work together to make a change. The smallest changes sometimes make the

biggest difference.

“Be the change you want to see in the world.” – Mahatma Gandhi

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Things we think are

keeping us from being

successful…

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“Bad grades are a barrier in success.”

“Try your best, no rest.”

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“This is why they call us “dirty”

Southbridge.”

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“Stay off the corners because they do nothing but get you in trouble.”

“Without protection, the streets could be

mean.”

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Other pictures of barriers to success…

“Yeah, because my sister

and brother be coming in

there and then my older

sister be coming in there.

There’s no quiet place in

my home”

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“I remember this one time I

wrote a seven page paper on

my phone because I didn’t

have internet access at home,

so I had to do all my research

on my phone; wrote the

whole paper on this old

phone that I had, and I didn’t

even get the scholarship.”

“You've always got to

walk this way and avoid

that. That's what we

always do to get to

school.”

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“It’s sort of like with the TV

and the games, once you get

on your phone, you’re on the

social networks and stuff,

you’re not going to really

remember, and you’re not

going to really care about

doing your homework. You’ll

just be like, oh, I’ll do it in the

morning or something, and

you end up just not doing it.”

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“That's where they be doing

their drugs. …And that's right

next to a school.”

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“It’s just a picture of a TV, and an Xbox. Basically saying that if you put

all those things, like your entertainment, before your schoolwork, nine

times out of ten, you won’t even finish it because you’ll get tied up in your

games, or you’ll get tied up watching TV, and then you’ll go to school

with incomplete work.”

“It's a barrier, because kids… Sometimes I’ll play on the games, and I’ll be

playing it too long, and sometimes I’ll be forgetting to do my homework.”

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“I want to say my friends,

because if they’re

distracting me, and talking

to me and all that stuff,

then I won’t get my work

done, and then I won’t get

the good grades.”

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Things we think help us

to be successful…

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“They worked hard to make this for me.”

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“Stay on

track.”

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“Start off easy to be successful.”

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Other pictures of things that make us think of success….

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“People can

come together

and stop it.”

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“That if you practice

hard enough that

you can get – you

can achieve

anything that you try

to do.”

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“And if you have A’s

and B’s, you might be

able to go to college if

you work really hard.”

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“Hard work is

rewarding.”

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“Math was like, basically about to

hold me back, and I was acting up

and stuff, always trying to be a

goofball, and then the teacher

called my mom and my mom had

this big talk with me from morning

until night

I think that’s the reason, because I

didn’t know how to do it, and I

didn’t want nobody laughing at me

for not being able to do it, so I

would sit there and get mad at my

teacher when she was trying to help

me. And I really thought she was

trying to embarrass me, but she

knew I didn’t know how to do it.”

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“I’m gonna get successful – or be

successful in life and I’m gonna get certain

stuff out of other people that does well, that

does like me…”

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“That no matter what

that they keep trying

until they get it right.”

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“Your skill or talent

isn’t determined by

your gender.”

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FUNDING: Leveraging Neighborhood Social Networks and Social Capital for Childhood Obesity Prevention is a

Delaware Clinical and Translational Research, ACCEL (DE-CTR, ACCEL) pilot study, supported by an

Institutional Development Award (IDeA) from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences of the National

Institutes of Health under grant number U54-GM104941 (PI: Binder-Macleod).

RESEARCH TEAM: Dr. Tirzah Spencer, (Principal Investigator); Dr. Brian Rahmer, (Co-Principal Investigator),

Rysheema Dixon, (Project Director), Jonathan Wilson, (Project Director); Kristen Isaac (Research Assistant);

Dana Reiss (Research Assistant); Zhongcui Gao (Statistician); Denise Hughes (PhotoVoice Trainer); Jan Abrams

(Administrative Support) [For additional information contact Tirzah Spencer; tirzah.spencer@nemours.org].

ADVISORY GROUP: Dr. Yasser Payne, (mentor); Dr. Sandra Hassink; Dr. Alisa Haushalter; Dr. Diane

Abatemarco; Dr. Joyce Essien; Dr. Laurens Holmes

We want to take time out to thank everyone who made this

project a success, we couldn’t have done this without you!

SPECIAL THANKS TO:

Southbridge Youth, Southbridge Community Partners, Neighborhood

House Inc., South Wilmington Planning Network, Peninsula

Compost, Councilwoman Hanifa Shabazz, CCHS Camp Fresh,

Christina Cultural Arts Center- Internship Program, Wilmington Parks

and Recreation

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the

only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead

“Togetherness, togetherness, and that’s

what Southbridge reminds me of.”

– youth participant