Youth Meaningfulness Index

Explore and measure how children and youth experience meaning in their lives.

The YMI aims to go beyond traditional approaches to youth and children’s well-being by focusing on how they experience meaning in their lives, placing their voices at the heart of this global conversation. Rather than offering a predefined solution, the YMI serves as an open framework and tool for exploring the factors that shape youth well-being through the lens of meaning.

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Overview

Information on this page is provided by the innovator and has not been evaluated by HundrED.

Updated April 2025

Web presence

2022

Established

6K 2023

10K 2024

8

Countries

All students

Target group

Through the YMI, we hope to see education systems become more inclusive and responsive by placing youth well-being, voice, and purpose at the center. The goal is to help students feel seen and engaged, influence what and how they learn, and ensure learning supports not just knowledge but meaning, resilience, and connection.

About the innovation

Why did you create this innovation?

We created the YMI to better understand how young people experience meaning in their lives by exploring their subjective experiences, an aspect often missing from traditional well-being metrics. YMI gathers youth insights on purpose, relationships, self-care, and voice. It supports programs and policies that help youth not just cope, but thrive with connection, direction, and agency.

What does your innovation look like in practice?

Supported by our multidisciplinary Academic Advisory Council and Youth Advisory Council, we have identified four key drivers of meaning for children and youth: Purpose, Self-care, Engagement, and Social Connectivity. Based on these, we developed the YMI tool to capture how young people experience meaning in their lives. In 2024, we piloted the tool across seven countries, in collaboration with universities, UNICEF, civil society organizations, and education institutions. The YMI is now applied in three key areas: policymaking (i.e., mechanisms for meaningful youth participation), program design (inc. youth-led initiatives), and impact measurement. In 2025, we plan to expand data collection to additional countries and strengthen collaboration with strategic partners. For instance, in Ukraine, we are working closely with UNESCO to roll out a comprehensive YMI-informed program, which includes the design and implementation of youth-led projects.

How has it been spreading?

Since its inception, the YMI has grown from a conceptual framework into a globally tested tool. Phase 1 began in 2023 with data collection in India, Denmark, and Norway. In 2024, Phase 2 expanded to Algeria, Morocco, Ukraine, Kenya, Peru, India, and Norway.The YMI holds potential to inform national policy discussions, shape youth-led initiatives, and guide the design of responsive programs across contexts. In India, for example, it has been used to assess the impact of education programs provided by the Salaam Bombay Foundation. In 2025, YMI aims to expand to new countries through more partnerships with organizations, institutions and educators.

If I want to try it, what should I do?

All resources and insights are publicly accessible on ymi.org. Feel free to also reach out to the head of the Voluntas Foundation and YMI program lead, Fanny Marchand, fma@voluntas.com.