Amanda Purington Drake ’04, M.P.S. ’09, Ph.D. ’22 is the new director of ACT for Youth.
Amanda Purington Drake ’04, M.P.S. ’09, Ph.D. ’22 has been named the new director of ACT for Youth, taking over from Jane Powers, Ph.D. ’85, who retired in June 2023. ACT for Youth connects the latest youth development research to practice.
Purington Drake started working with ACT for Youth in 2003, first as a work-study student and then as part of the evaluation team. Purington Drake also worked with other BCTR projects, notably the Cornell Research Program on Self-Injury and Recovery with Janis Whitlock, before Powers asked her to lead ACT for Youth’s evaluation team in 2013.
“In that position, I would try to find ways to conduct evaluations more efficiently,” Drake said. “We went from collecting data on paper — which took a massive number of resources to collect, enter and store — to an online system where we spend very little time cleaning up the data. It’s pulled into an online data visualization system so you can drill down and get insights about programming and know what’s going well and what isn’t.”
The hunt for efficiency continues for Purington Drake in her new role. As director, she will continue to find ways that will make the organization more efficient and more effective with its partners. ACT for Youth’s major partnership with the New York State Department of Health (NYSDOH) provides resources, training and evaluation for NYSDOH adolescent health initiatives like Comprehensive Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention (CAPP), Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP), Sexual Risk Avoidance Education (SRAE) and HIV/STI/HCV prevention programs. ACT for Youth also partners on youth-centered initiatives with The Learning Web and Cornell Cooperative Extension and is tapped nationally for its expertise in youth development and engagement.
Purington Drake is also looking to diversify the areas ACT for Youth is involved with by branching out into areas such as supporting children and youth with special health care needs, youth mental health or other social-emotional learning topics.
“I would like for ACT for Youth to contribute to the larger field of knowledge related to these topics,” Purington Drake said. “The constant current that connects all our work is positive youth development, so these areas fit nicely with that identity.”
The transition to new leadership has been smooth, Purington Drake said, because the organization has an experienced team. The “newest” team member has been there for four years. Purington Drake has been there for 20 years, starting when she was an undergraduate looking for an honors project and reached out to Powers — a suggestion from Professor Steve Hamilton.
“I’m so deeply appreciative of Jane’s mentorship,” Purington Drake said. “Having her as my mentor has profoundly affected who I am and where I am today.”
