Rethinking Adolescence: How We Got Here & and Why It Matters is a short-or long-form course that invites students to examine the many assumptions we hold about teens – beliefs that feel undeniable and often go unquestioned. But what if these supposed “facts” – raging hormones, rebelling against authority, impulsivity that leads to high-risk behaviors – aren’t universal, but instead products of a particular historical moment?

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Through historical inquiry, critical analysis, and personal reflection, students explore how forces such as colonialism, capitalism, immigration, and industrialization shaped the modern concept of adolescence in the United States—and how these ideas continue to influence schools, social systems, and youth work today.

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Grounded in lived experience and research, students reimagine more justice-oriented, youth-centered, and liberatory ways of understanding and supporting young people, offering a counter to the problem-focused and pathologizing narratives that are often held.