Northern Youth Abroad

“NYA Next”

2017 – 2024

The Foundation supported the piloting of a new program called NYA Next. NYA Next serves youth ages 16–22 from Nunavut and the NWT. NYA Next directly addresses the root cause of many young people’s failure to launch. It provides the chance for exploration and discovery, builds job and career specific skills, and invests in each participant’s confidence and independence — all crucial aspects of making sound career decisions that meet one’s goals, interests and abilities. The program helps to address the gaps that exist that hinder equitable access for youth from the North as they transition from high school to next steps (whether post-secondary or the workforce).

NYA Next begins with several months of preparation and assignments completed by participants in their home community. Participants then travel to Ottawa to take part in a week-long orientation camp that provides a foundation of skills to help them prepare for the summer.

After orientation, participants move to Algonquin College where they will spend the next five weeks. Participants live together in student housing and will experience an environment similar to a post-secondary student. They will also volunteer, participate in a construction course, and complete a self-directed Personal Learning Project. The youth learn how to work and live together as a team, while building independence and life skills. Participants conclude their summer with a Re-Orientation week before returning to their home communities to share their experiences with their communities, families, and friends.

In 2024, 14 participants completed the Next program (7 from Nunavut and 7 from the Northwest Territories). Each participants completed:

  • 8 high school credits
  • 50 hours of construction and trade skills
  • Workshops focused on personal development
  • Exploration of career pathways
  • Preparation for post-secondary options
  • 50+ hours of volunteer experience
  • Presentation and public speaking practice
  • Exploring avenues for personal success by working one-on-one with our Participant Achievement Coach.

A few key insights from this work as shared by Northern Youth Abroad

Designing and deploying Next allowed us to better understand how a new program acts and interacts differently to programs that are now 26 and 27 years old. We think that the most significant lesson was around program design. In many ways, Next was lovingly designed down to the tiny detail and, in others, it was made to look and feel like our other programs. For example, the length of the program placement was originally seven weeks, essentially the same as the Canadian Program. It was not until after the pandemic that we tried shortening the placement to four weeks. We found this to be a much better timeline for participants in this program specifically. We also realized that participants could benefit from going directly into Next, as opposed to needing to complete another NYA program first. Additionally, we did not predict that the group atmosphere would remove participants from some of the risk-taking which is so elemental to an NYA experience. These lessons have sometimes slowly, turned into changes and adjustments.

We believe the greatest strength of NYA Next is in its intention to create a diverse experience for participants that allows them to build the skills and clarity necessary to set and navigate their goals, whatever they may be. While the program continues to build and change its core value has remained: assemble a group of young adults from across Nunavut and the Northwest Territories and offer them as many opportunities to learn, grow and test their preferences as possible. This is done by living on campus, hands on learning and volunteer work, cultural experiences and exchange, group living and personalized planning and coaching. We believe that this model is the program’s strength and, regardless of any growing pains a new program encounters, that every youth that has participated has benefitted from this carefully designed model and the network of individuals who gather each year to deliver it.

Advice for others

  • We have seen the deep benefits of providing experiences that promote cross-cultural learning and sharing while bringing youth out of their comfort zone. This provides participants the opportunity to build confidence and feel deep pride in who they are and where they come from. Finally, we feel that experience is imperative to understanding the impacts of intergenerational trauma and to being prepared for the spectrum of ways that this may present itself.
  • Working with remote, isolated Indigenous communities in the North requires strong community contacts and context, flexibility, and additional planning around logistics, budget, etc. Additionally, from our context of having youth from diverse backgrounds from Nunavut and the NWT form a group away from home, we have found it important to prepare participants for things like homesickness, culture shock and navigating foreign places and systems.
  • Be patient as a project develops and invest in long-term partner relationships with those who want to see the program improve and grow. Time and a in it for the long-term mindset have created a more sustainable and, therefore, effective program for the youth that we serve.

About Northern Youth Abroad

Founded in 1998, Northern Youth Abroad (NYA) is a registered not-for-profit charitable organization that cultivates youth leadership, individual career goals, cross-cultural awareness, and global citizenship amongst northern youth aged 15-22. The program deeply strengthens self-identity and personal cultural understanding while enhancing student participation and success in the secondary school system, and beyond, by providing a life-changing and life-directing experience relevant to the needs and aspirations of northern youth.

https://nya.ca