emPOWER!

Empowerment Curriculum for Youth

Pamela Woll, MA, CADP

emPOWER! is an "empowerment curriculum" developed for students in the Joliet Township High Schools as part of their YESS (Youth Experiencing Success in School) Program. Available for free download, this curriculum includes:

An 88-page Leaders' Guide, in instructional design format, that teachers, counselors, and peer leaders can use to deliver this 12-session curriculum
An 84-page Students' Guide, with multiple tools for each of the 12 sessions.
A 22-page Strengths Inventory, designed to be undertaken at the beginning of the process and added to throughout, and to make it as easy as possible for students to find and acknowledge their strengths

All three documents are available for free download below.

The curriculum was written with the understanding that many of the young people who would be engaging in these sessions lived in homes and/or neighborhoods—and in a larger world—where pain, danger, and trauma are integral parts of everyday reality. It was designed to help them learn to: