MOASH AF provides statewide leadership on adolescent sexual health through youth-centered and youth-driven advocacy, lobbying, civic engagement,

and political endorsements.

MISSION

MOASH AF envisions a world which affirms the growth and development of all youth, powered by youth-driven

sexual health policy

change.

VISION

Our Core Values

Youth are the experts.

We believe that youth are leaders when it comes to decision-making and policy solutions.

Young people’s passion, experiences, and commitment to change make them the perfect voices for political action.

Youth lead change.

Youth power with and in their communities inspires us to move away from apathy and towards hope.

MOASH AF aims to open space for discussion about sexual health, sexuality, and gender identity with an intersectional lens that creates critical thinkers and doers. Community, school, and family networks that support and affirm youth growth and development benefit all of us.

Focus Areas

Our goal is to empower young people to politically advocate for themselves and their peers in front of any decision-maker, including elected officials. We believe that elected officials have a responsibility to represent and support the needs of their youth constituents. MOASH AF is committed to ensuring young people are actively involved, hold decision-making power in all relevant spaces, and hold their elected officials accountable.

Additionally, we aim to identify, support, and collaborate with youth-friendly candidates across local, state, and federal levels, including supporting young people in their efforts to run for office.

We work to promote a culture of safety and respect by championing policies for gender equity, as well as clear consent communication in sexual relationships.

We support many efforts around sexual assault prevention, awareness, and services for survivors; consent-inclusive sexual health education; affirmative consent policies; anti-harassment and anti-discrimination policies related to sex, gender (including gender identity and gender expression), or marital or parental status; and more.

Our History

MOASH AF was founded as a 501(c)(4) organization in early 2022 to respond to the urgent need to protect and advance the sexual and reproductive health rights of youth in Michigan. Although MOASH, MOASH AF’s 501(c)(3) sister organization, has a history in leading youth-led advocacy, the limitations of a 501(c)(3) designation have created barriers to fully and honestly addressing the root causes of inequity in health outcomes and the linkages between social determinants of health, health disparities, and health equity.

Recognizing the need for independent political infrastructure focused on adolescent sexual health, MOASH AF was created to fill this gap.

MOASH AF recognizes the racist history of sexual and reproductive health work and movements, and that dismantling systems of oppression is the only way to shift conditions and achieve reproductive justice. One critical way to do so is through influencing politics, policy, and laws that shape the systems of oppression that cause many young people to be less able to access services and information necessary for them to make the best and most informed decisions for them. To ensure young people’s voices are heard, MOASH AF is necessary to directly recruit youth-friendly candidates to run for office at local and state levels, endorse youth-friendly candidates in school board and non-partisan races, and more closely work with legislators who will protect and support young peoples’ interests.

DEI Statement

At MOASH AF, we commit to grounding our work in equity, inclusion, diversity, and justice within all aspects of our organization and within the field of adolescent sexual health. We will work toward liberation for all youth.

We acknowledge the deep intersectional connection between sexual health and oppression. We recognize and must understand the history of white supremacy, racism, adultism, classism, capitalism, systemic poverty, carceral systems, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, fatphobia, sexism, ableism, and environmental degradation that is embedded at the core of youth sex education and health services, including the people, groups, and policies that have privilege and power. Our understanding of this continues to evolve; we exercise cultural humility as we encounter this history and its enduring societal structures and attitudes which we work to dismantle. We commit to moving forward in developing and using more liberatory models, centering the voices of youth who have historically been marginalized.

This work is urgent, and we will always be learning. We will make mistakes and own our responsibility for restorative action. In alignment with the principles of transformative justice movements, accountability for us means acknowledging the harm done, repairing the harm, and changing what we do. We will engage in these processes in conversation with our communities, prioritizing the needs of those we’ve harmed. We will be open and transparent throughout the process as we participate in opportunities for continuous learning and growth.