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Helping Young Men Make Healthy Choices

Published June 2020

Helping Young Men Make Healthy Choices 

June is Men’s Health Month, a national observance hosted by the Office of Minority Health to heighten awareness of preventable health problems, promote early detection and treatment of disease, and encourage men, boys, and their families to practice and implement healthy living decisions. 

Adolescence is a great time to start encouraging healthy decision-making, as it is a period of enormous developmental change and can set the stage for positive physical, emotional, and social behavior later in life. OPA’s Teen Pregnancy Prevention (TPP) Program funds diverse organizations that work to prevent teenage pregnancy and encourage healthy behaviors that can be sustained into adulthood. During Men’s Health Month, OPA recognizes the TPP grantee programs working to teach adolescent males positive decision-making skills: 

  • New York University’s Fathers Raising Responsible Men program is designed to reduce risky adolescent male sexual behavior by supporting father-son communication about sex and sexual and reproductive health services. This program provides fathers with guidance on positive parenting topics, such as relationship-building, positive youth development, effective parental monitoring, and supervision.
  • The Public Health Management Corporation’s Promoting Awareness through Live Movement and Sound (PALMS-TPP) skills-building program is designed for young black men in urban, non-school settings and uses theater to spark conversation about the challenges young men face regarding sexual behavior and reproductive health decision-making. 

Wise Guys, from the Children’s Home Society of North Carolina, is a responsibility health education curriculum helping young men redefine what manhood means to them and supporting them in making positive sexual health decisions. Young men participate in a variety of activities, including games and quizzes, role-plays, small-group projects, and brainstorming.

One picture of a father and teenage son sitting on the couch reading a paper, captioned Fathers Raising Responsible Men Participants. A picture of two men sitting in chairs, smiling and high-fiving, captioned PALMS-TPP Participants. One picture of a laughing man and younger boy, captioned Wise Guys Participants.

Learn more about OPA’s innovative TPP grantee programs working to prevent teen pregnancy and encourage healthy decision-making across the United States.

New Website from We Think Twice Campaign

We Think Twice is a youth-driven social media campaign from the Family and Youth Services Bureau that empowers teens to build knowledge and skills to form healthy relationships and make healthy decisions. The campaign just released a new website with a variety of resources for youth, including quizzes, videos, playlists, and more. 

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