Office of Adolescent Health | Website: http://www.hhs.gov/ash/oah/TAG @TeenHealthGov Email: TAGTEAM@hhs.gov 

TAG in Action: Teen Health and Success Partnership

As part of its national call to action, Adolescent Health, Think, Act, GrowSM (TAG), the Office of Adolescent 

Health, in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service has identified a number of successful strategies

for improving adolescent health throughout the country. 

The Goal

The Teen Health and Success Partnership (THSP) at the University of Rochester offers 

young people the chance to learn valuable job and life skills, connect with mentors, and 

access educational support. 

The Game 

Plan

THSP provides employment opportunities and helps prepare youth for careers in health 

care, academic settings, and research while promoting well-being. Through its Be 

Employed Be Successful program, THSP works to improve the roughly 50 percent high 

school graduation rate for youth in the Rochester City School District. Youth in the program

work at the University of Rochester and receive multiple services including career 

shadowing opportunities, college preparation assistance, free tutoring, life skills 

development, access to programs to improve wellness, career coaching, and job training.

This program has helped more than 200 youth graduate from high school and transition to 

college, vocational school, or full-time employment. The program is helping youth improve 

outcomes: 100 percent graduate from high school; 79 percent enroll in college or 

vocational school; and 63 percent have been promoted at work.

THSP also collaborates with the Rochester City School District’s Leadership Academy for 

Young Men on a program to improve the high school graduation rates for African American 

males and Latino males in the school district. Young Men of Rochester: UR BOLD (Building 

Outstanding Leadership & Distinction) provides much-needed support and services to help 

teen males experience success in high school and prepare for college and employment. UR 

BOLD offers participating youth opportunities for mentoring, seminars on skill-building, 

visits to the University of Rochester college campus to deepen their understanding of what 

college is like, and connections to resources that support personal development and career 

success.

The 

Winning 

Plays

THSP was recently awarded the 2015 Hilary E.C. Millar Award for Innovative Approaches to 

Adolescent Health Care by the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine for its valuable 

contributions to the well-being of youth in Rochester. Upon receiving this award, Suzanne 

M. Piotrowski, M.D., clinical associate professor in the Department of Family Medicine at 

the University of Rochester and director of THSP stated: “This is a replicable model of 

community collaboration to promote the health, academic success and gainful 

employment of urban youth. Rochester’s THSP youth are changing the startlingly chronic 

poverty and school failure statistics of Rochester.”

Learn 

More 

Teen Health and Success Partnership

https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/community-health/programs-services/teen-health-successpartnerships.aspx