Recreation and the Glenview Neighborhood: Implications for Youth and Community Development

The purpose of this interpretive study was to explore the voices of the ecological agents surrounding the youth of Glenview, a low-resource neighborhood. The research focused on a phenomenon that involved the establishment and discontinuation of a community organization effort to provide structured recreation programs for youth. Theoretical frameworks of the ecological perspective and community social organization guided the study. Twenty-one participants were interviewed. Four major themes were constructed from the data through constant comparison: the neighborhood environment, despondence, parental conditions and parental involvement. Implications relate to social capital and recreation's role in youth and community development.

Keywords:

• Keywords at-risk youth and families community development
• ecological framework
• recreation
• social capital
• youth development

Acknowledgments

This paper is based on Cari Autry's doctorate dissertation at the University of Florida and was presented at the World Leisure European Congress in Malmö, Sweden, May 2005. The authors would like to thank Dr. Autry's committee members and the Leisure Sciences reviewers, associate editor, and editors for their valuable time, suggestions and enhancement of this research study and manuscript.