Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Youth In Service To Elders (Yiste) Program: A Case Study, Sally Newman, Heather Newman, Roland Onawola, Caroline Thompson

Intergenerational

The Youth In Service To Elders (YISTE) Program was developed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to meet some of the psychosocial needs of the frail elderly and young student volunteers. The objectives were to promote positive interactions between these groups, to improve the psychosocial well-being of the frail elderly, and to improve the student volunteers' feelings about themselves and about aging. This paper describes the YISTE program and its evaluation. The program sequence was recruitment of youth and elders, training of youth participants, supervision of the youth and elder participants, recognition, and evaluation. Two distinctive features of the program were the involvement …