Taking Care & Taking Action
From Our President & CEO
Janet Max, MPH, CHES
In the 2023 fiscal year (October 2022 through September 2023), we added new staff to our team, launched our research to practice center, Thrivology alongside the Johns Hopkins Center for Adolescent Health, worked together to support the health of young people in rural communities through True You Maryland, and so much more.
It’s been an honor to work together across departments and collaboratively across organizations in 2023—as caregivers, educators, and changemakers who give it all for today’s youth and the generations yet to come.
We know you do your best when you’re connected to great opportunities, resources, and to others working in sexual and reproductive health.
Together, we can take action to build a better world for the young people of today and future leaders of tomorrow. Our resilience fuels the resistance.
Highlights
In 2023, we worked together towards collective action and healing. Here are just a few highlights from our work in the 2023 fiscal year:
Thrivology
We bring you the latest science on how to provide the very best programs and services, so young people may thrive.
True You Maryland
True You Maryland brings together partners in six rural Maryland counties. Together, we’re working to advance the sexual health and well-being of youth here at home.
U Choose
U Choose is a collaborative approach to providing evidence-based sexuality education and youth-friendly reproductive health services to Baltimore City youth.
Vaccinated Children, Stronger Families
When our children are up to date with their immunizations, other children and families are protected too. Let’s build stronger communities by ensuring that our children are vaccinated.
The Healthy Teen Oracle
We created the Healthy Teen Oracle Deck, a set of cards to support young people as they think through their health-related decisions and ask if they want to make any changes.
With the Healthy Teen Oracle deck, the card a young person selects can also serve as a starting point for discussions with health professionals or other trusted adults. The deck centers around 16 unique, health-related Oracle cards, with properties such as uncertainty, ritual, and encouragement.
We featured the content in two ways: 1) a digital version shared on Instagram, for young people, and 2) a physical deck of cards professionals can use with the young people they serve.
Our social media campaign uses storytelling to provide young people with models for how to navigate barriers to receiving health care and still get the services and support they need. We designed this campaign for social media sharing, to reach young people where they are most likely to be. We specifically shared the content on Instagram because testing showed that young people prefer the platform.
Our printed card deck for professionals, on the other hand, takes a more personalized approach appropriate for sparking conversations between young people and caring adults. The cards provide an engaging tool for professionals to start potentially challenging conversations: they can use young people’s chosen cards to guide the direction of their discussion, then ask targeted follow-ups to delve deeper.
Vaccinated Children, Stronger Communities | Collaboration with the Baltimore City Health Department
When our children are up to date with their immunizations, other children and families are protected, too. Let’s build stronger communities by ensuring that our children are vaccinated. Visit the Baltimore City Health Department’s Immunization Program to learn more! This video was created in partnership with the Baltimore City Health Department and UChoose Baltimore.
2023 FINANCIALS
Fiscal Year 2023 Financial Data*
*unaudited
our Supporters
Mark Barbour
April Bell
Betsy Berner
Bart Bombay
Andrew Bradtke
Bridget Casey
Linda Dawkins
Tracey Ebony
Donna Elliston
Monica Faulkner
Patti Flowers-Coulson
Mackenzie Flynn
Lora Fults
Marsha Gilbert
Judith Herrman
Dawn Ireton
Jack & Jill of America Inc. Balto. Co. Chapter
Trichia Joyce Phillips
Laurie Max
Trenace Mic
Michael and Judy Leopold through Jewish Community Foundation
Patrick Monk
Guy Moody
Pat Paluzzi
Valerie Parker
Kiel Quinn
Shannon Rauh
Bruce Riggins
Cris Sanchez
Lisa Schreiber
Karen Skelly
Ted Smith
The Kulash Family Fund
Julie Thompson
Allison Tomai Felsen
Tracy VanVlack
Anthony Vela
Casey Young Parents Stories
Funded by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Healthy Teen Network developed two mobile-friendly digital stories based on the real lives of young parents in the foster care system.
While statistics and infographics exist, there is a general lack of understanding about the unique needs and non-traditional pathways that young parents have to take to raise families, secure housing, receive education, find financial stability, and receive healthcare services. That’s why it’s so important to share the real, authentic stories of young parents that have the power to evoke empathy and drive policy.
Conference
Take Care & Take Action | #HealthyTeen23
When we started thinking about the 2023 conference theme, the questions we kept coming back to was “How do we honor what we are feeling, how do we care of ourselves and sustain ourselves, so we can take action and keep moving forward to seek the change we want in this world?”
We planned the 2023 year’s conference for our members—the caregivers, educators, and changemakers who give it all for today’s youth and the generations yet to come.
At #HealthyTeen23, we took a deeper look at just that—how do we care for ourselves? How do we cultivate healing of the mind, body, and soul?
I want to thank everyone who attended this year’s conference for joining us in Portland and being vulnerable as we learn together. As Jason said during our youth panel on Tuesday morning, it is okay not to know something, but it isn’t okay not to learn.
And one way to learn is to listen. People, be it young people or our colleagues, will tell you what they want, what they need. It is our job to listen…and then take action on what we heard.
Board & Staff
Our 2023 Board
Interested in joining our Board? We’re not currently recruiting, but if you’re interested in future opportunities, please let us know.
Chair
Shannon Rauh, MEd,
AASECT Certified Sexuality Educator
Senior Consultant, JSI Research and Training Institute
Vice Chair
Monica Faulkner, PhD, LMSW
Director and Research Associate Professor, Texas Institute for Child and Family Wellbeing, Steve Hicks School of Social Work
Treasurer
Anthony Vela
Program Manager, U.S. Department of Labor
Secretary
Brina Bolden, JD
Senior Acquisitions Officer, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs
April J. Bell, PhD, MPH
Assistant Professor, University of California San Francisco
Donna Elliston, DrPH, MSPH
Senior Consultant, Westat
Patti Flowers–Coulson
Public Health and Administrative Organizer, Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development, Inc. (BUILD)
Mackenzie Flynn
Policy and Annual Conference Manager, AIDS United
Aisha Mays
Anthony D. Motyl, LICSW
Director of Grants and Sponsored Research, Springfield College
Valerie J. Parker, MA, LMFT, LCSW
Executive Director, Young Families of Indiana Network, Future Promises
Marilyn Preston
Associate Professor of Human Services, Metropolitan State University
Preston Shatwell
Our 2023 Staff
Looking Ahead
Some of our priorities for 2024…
Thrivology
We bring you the latest science on how to provide the very best programs and services, so young people may thrive.
In/Tend is a vibrant ecosystem of dreamers, doers, and change-makers who push the boundaries of imagination to develop innovative approaches to adolescent health.
Pulse puts the power of sexual health information, in English and Spanish, in the hands of millions of young women.
#HealthyTeen24
At #HealthyTeen24, we’ll extend a hand to the willing and wavering—to the dreamers and doers cheering on change and to those imploring, “steady as we go.”
Learn More
Check out some of our other work.
