Established in 2011, VoiceWaves is a youth development program that uplifts young people ages 14-24, with a focus on BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and immigrant youth from underserved neighborhoods in North and West Long Beach. We provide youth with tools, knowledge, and mentorship to mobilize their visions for themselves and their communities through multimedia storytelling.
VoiceWaves creates a youth-led space where young people’s lived experiences are recognized as expertise, allowing them to reclaim agency and shift dominant narratives around critical issues in Long Beach and beyond. Youth participate in advocacy trainings and digital media workshops that equip them to use storytelling as a tool for social change. Through one-on-one mentorship, collaborative team projects, and access to professional equipment, youth create original content — from short films and photo essays to social media campaigns and over 1,000 zines distributed across the city. Through this creative work, youth have the chance to reimagine more just worlds and amplify urgent community priorities that directly impact their daily lives such as mental health, climate justice, LGBTQ+ advocacy, immigrant rights and safety, and youth opportunities.
What sets yli apart is that our work doesn’t just stop at storytelling. Our youth leaders transform their storytelling into real-world advocacy by speaking at city council meetings, serving as panelists on city roundtables, and facilitating community-based workshops for peers across Los Angeles county.
Interested in Joining?
VoiceWaves is open to Long Beach youth between the ages of 14 to 24, regardless of your experience level with media. To join, contact our office’s program coordinator Itzel at [email protected] or fill out this Google Form.
Our Latest Projects
Youth Opioid Awareness Project
In partnership with the City of Long Beach Department of Health and Human Services’ Harm Reduction Program, seven yli VoiceWaves youth leaders successfully completed Long Beach’s first city-funded, youth-led opioid awareness campaign. Over the year-long effort, they conducted peer-led focus groups, launched a social media campaign, produced 250+ harm reduction zines, and hosted a public showcase that brought city officials, community members, and students together to learn life-saving Narcan administration and fentanyl testing techniques.
yli Youth Leader Anaya’s original character, Nick the Narcan, will be featured on 18 bus shelter ads across the city to promote overdose response education. As a result of the success of this campaign, our youth leaders secured a meeting with the Director of the Department of Health & Human Services to explore next steps to continue expanding opioid awareness in Long Beach!
ClimateLB Stop Motion Film Series
Funded by the City of Long Beach Office of Climate Action & Sustainability, the ClimateLB initiative engaged youth ages 14–24 in using yli’s YPAR model to examine environmental inequities in West Long Beach. Youth researchers led every stage of storytelling and production, creating original stop-motion films that spotlighted local climate impacts and community-driven solutions.
The project culminated in a public screening and interactive workshop where youth presented their films, facilitated a Q&A, and community art activities—empowering attendees to share their own climate justice stories.
