Stories of resilience and change
Project YouthBuild (PYB) is an educational, occupational, and leadership program that empowers young people with low incomes who have left school to build stronger futures. At PYB, students work toward earning their high school diplomas while gaining practical skills and confidence to enter the workforce.
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Collaborating with the program’s director and leadership instructor, I identified an opportunity to design a storytelling process that would help students reflect on their resilience and reframe their personal narratives. Drawing on the program’s previous reflective writing exercises and my experience designing narrative methodologies, I created Stories of Resilience and Change, a series of three workshops centered on storytelling as a tool for reflection and growth.
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Stories of Resilience and Change invites Project YouthBuild students to use storytelling as a way to reflect on their past experiences and reimagine their narratives through the lens of resilience. Through this process, they identify life lessons that guide them in facing future challenges and that can inspire others in their communities. Students record their stories and reflections in a journal, which later becomes a tool for sharing and connection.​​
Social Design • Storytelling • Workshop facilitation
U.S.
Resilience and change workshops
The Stories of Resilience and Change workshops created a safe space for students to share and reflect through storytelling. Using guided prompts and journaling, they explored moments of struggle and growth, analyzing their experiences as narratives of resilience. Group discussions and creative exercises encouraged active listening, empathy, and mutual support, turning personal reflection into a collective process of expression and reflection.
process highlights
Research and Planning
The research phase involved close collaboration with Project YouthBuild students who shared their life stories and experiences with us. This process helped identify the language and prompts that could best trigger storytelling and reflection. These insights informed the structure and focus of the workshops.
Material
Design
Based on the research findings, I designed the workshop flow and produced the supporting materials, journals, prompts, and visual tools, that would guide participants through each exercise.
Workshop Framework
To organize the sessions, I adapted the tool Experience of a Service to outline the people, interactions, content, and objects needed at every step of the workshops. This framework became one of the main deliverables, enabling the program to replicate and sustain the Stories of Resilience and Change workshops independently.