MHA Labs is the manifestation of a grassroots community dedicated to developing and celebrating the 21st century skills of youth and young adults. 21st century skills are the essential foundation for human development and fuel personal agency, positive relationships, career success, and community power.
Skill Frameworks
MHA Labs used academic research and community insights to create two 21st Century Essential Skill Frameworks that can be used by anyone supporting skills development. 21st century skills is a domain term that encompasses social emotional skills, soft skills, essential skills, leadership skills, life skills, career readiness skills, and college readiness skills. These skills lay the foundation for human development and are critical to academic, career, and life success.
Skill Building Practices
Everyone has a role in building skills. Youth, parents, grandparents, caregivers, teachers, after school instructors, community members, and employers all have the power to support skills development. To make skills building accessible, MHA labs connected a simple set of existing practices into a method called REFRAME that anyone can use.
Skill Resources
MHA Labs worked in collaboration with 100’s of practitioners over the course of 12 years to create user-friendly tools and resources that can transform any activity into an opportunity for skills growth. Resources are free to anyone aligned to the values of the MHA community.
Skill Building Support
After 10 years of amazing partnership and collaboration, we have empowered YouthForce NOLA to be our technical assistance and training partner. The YouthForce NOLA team truly embodies the core values of the MHA community. They offer an array of free and fee-based trainings, resources, and consulting services to help you and your organization embrace skills development.
Watch Our Founding Story
MHA Labs was launched in 2012 as part of a W.K. Kellogg Foundation innovation lab called The New Option Project. The New Options Project invested in the scale of a skills assessment prototyped by Leslie Beller for Chicago Public Schools. In just three years, this prototype was transformed into an innovation lab and national grassroots movement celebrating the skills of youth and young adults.