Youth Market: Evaluation of a Paid Summer Internship to Promote Food Justice in Northern Manhattan

Abstract

Engaging adolescents and young adults in food justice initiatives is a powerful tool to address the complex landscape of food-related inequities. Youth Market is a paid 8-week summer internship in Northern Manhattan that engages 16- to 22-year olds in managing a farm stand, leading nutrition workshops, and distributing food to families experiencing food insecurity. Through a positive youth development lens, the program aims to empower interns to become ambassadors of healthy food access in their community, while supporting their personal health and career goals. Matched, de-identified, pre–post online surveys of Summer 2021 and 2022 interns and a 1-year follow-up survey of Summer 2021 interns used Likert-type scale and open-ended questions to assess program satisfaction and perceived knowledge, attitudes, and self-efficacy regarding nutrition behaviors, food insecurity resources, and community connectedness. Pre–post results (n = 35) demonstrated high program satisfaction and statistically significant increases in interns’ self-reported fruit and vegetable consumption, confidence in ability to share information about healthy eating and food insecurity resources, and sense of community connectedness. Longitudinal results (n = 13) showed some significant improvements from baseline. Youth Market demonstrates a valuable model for youth engagement in paid work to promote community access to healthy food, improve knowledge and resource-sharing related to nutrition and food insecurity, and support youth career development.