The Crossroads Collaborative included multidisciplinary faculty and students from the University of Arizona, and youth-oriented community partners Wingspan (now the Southern Arizona AIDS Foundation), the Gay-Straight Alliance Network, Kore Press Grrls Literary Activism, Tucson Youth Poetry Slam, and YWCA Tucson. The collaborative was dedicated to advancing research, graduate training, public conversation, and ultimately social change in the area of youth, sexuality, health, and rights (YSHR).
In 2011, Crossroads Collaborative received a nationally competitive grant from the Ford Foundation to train students to be sexuality scholars, while working with local community-based, youth-serving organizations to foster collaboration and create more spaces for youth voices and action. Together, affiliated faculty, graduate students, community organizations and youth worked to understand what and how young people learn about the intersections of the full spectrum and dimensions of their identities, and what it all means for their health and well-being.