About Us

Download FlyerFocused solely on youth issues, the LOSH Young Workers Project is designed to address environmental and occupational health problems that teenagers face at work. Young Workers was initiated with funding from state initiatives in 1996 and continues to operate from its offices on the UCLA campus.

The Project staff is available to answer questions concerning youth rights on the job, child labor laws, and advice for youth who encounter health and safety problems at work. The Young Workers Project also organizes educational programs, develops school curricula, provides classroom training, and prepares youth to become peer educators in the health and safety field.

The Young Workers Project partners with high school educators, career advisors, life-skills coordinators, and community-based organizations to address teen worker and social justice issues.

In its early years, the Young Workers Project aided awareness and provided education through classroom-based curricula and peer education in underrepresented communities of Los Angeles.

Programs evolved with supplemental funding to expand beyond local high schools and reach youth statewide through an annual Young Worker Leadership Academy held in northern California every January and in southern California every February. The academy aids youth in developing leadership and communication skills, problem-solving strategies, and a broad knowledge of health and safety issues. Participants later become involved in their communities using these skills to directly educate their peers about workplace rights and protections and to advocate for reform and protection in their workplaces.

The Young Workers Project also collaborates with other state agencies to plan events for the May is Safe Jobs for Youth Month in California campaign. These events help raise awareness and campaign for a statewide labor relations curriculum that includes a workplace health and safety component.

Funding