The RAN Lab Community Advisory Board (CAB) serves as a bridge between research and the communities it aims to understand and uplift. Made up of youth, caregivers, educators, mental health workers, and community advocates, the CAB provides lived-experience insight, cultural awareness, and direct community voice to guide our research process.
Purpose & Mission
The RAN CAB ensures that research involving adolescents is community-informed, ethically grounded, culturally responsive, and accessible. Members offer feedback on study design, outreach, participant experience, and how research findings are translated back into the community. Our goal is to empower collaboration — not just collecting data from communities, but learning with them.
What the CAB Does
Advises on research priorities and study procedures
Helps shape communication, recruitment, and family engagement approaches
Ensures studies reflect community needs, values, and lived realities
Supports dissemination of results back to schools, families, and youth programs
Helps develop workshops, psycho-education, and outreach initiatives
Who Makes Up the CAB
Our board includes:
Adolescents and young adults
Parents & caregivers
Community organization leaders
Educators & youth workers
Mental/behavioral health advocates
Students and emerging researchers
Diverse perspective is core to our board — each member contributes experience, culture, insight, and voice.
Why CAB Matters
Research is strongest when the people who are impacted are part of the decision-making. The CAB helps us:
Improve representation
Increase trust and accessibility
Build research with community, not on community
✔️ Shape studies that reflect real-world needs
✔️ Strengthen outcomes for youth and families
Why CAB Matters
Improve representation
Increase trust and accessibility
Build research with community, not on community
Shape studies that reflect real-world needs
Strengthen outcomes for youth and families
Interested in joining the CAB? Please complete this application.
