Chapter 11: Distilling Public Secondary Education for At-Risk Youth in Trinidad and Tobago

The effectiveness of government education policies in public secondary schools is fundamental to sustainability. Social policy research in youth development is salient for developing nation-states, such as Trinidad and Tobago, which experiences a dearth in such research in a globalized environment. This study was pertinent as it examined three major government policies and mandates to determine the extent to which they met the needs of at-risk youth, aged 15–19 years at public secondary schools. We analysed the data using content analysis in the qualitative, social constructivist approach, with a priori themes from the Caribbean Group for Cooperation in Economic Development’s (CGCED) ecological framework for youth development. The framework is a model and a theory for predicting adult outcomes. The findings show government mandates and policies for educational development do not meet the needs of at-risk youth, adverse societal conditions stymie youth transition to adulthood and indigenous rather than international mandates should inform at-risk youth development. The findings have implications for policy formation and research, curriculum reform, youth empowerment and sustainability.