His youth advocacy efforts include service as a practitioner member of the United States Coordinating Council on Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention during the administrations of Presidents Clinton, Bush, and Obama.
[3] Brendtro is a licensed psychologist and director of Resilience Resources, Lennox, South Dakota, providing research, publication, and training in collaboration with CF Learning a program of Cal Farley's of Amarillo, Texas.
A doctoral dissertation by sociologist William Jackson[6] documents how these four core values (or their synonyms) are foundations of most key models of childhood socialization and positive youth development research.
This model contends that meeting growth needs applies not only to young people but equally to those who operate in leadership and service roles, creating the relationships and environments where children can flourish.
These evidence-based principles are being employed in education, treatment, juvenile justice, social service, youth development, and faith-based settings as described in a recent book with contributions from over 30 international leaders in transforming children, families, communities, and organizations.
Larry Brendtro with Lesley du Toit of South Africa developed Response Ability Pathways (RAP) to enable all who work with youth to respond to needs rather than react to problems.
Howard Bath from Australia teamed with John Seita to pilot Helping Kids Who Hurt which provides educators and direct care workers with practical strategies for turning trauma into resilience.