Exploring Youth Perspectives: FGD Sessions in Solo and Denpasar

By Hasanatun Nisa Thamrin

In June Kota Kita conducted the Focus Group Discussion (FGD) with participants under 18 years old, both in Solo and Denpasar. In Solo, we involved 12 junior high school students aged 13-15, and in Denpasar, the participants ranged from 14-18 years old. Unlike the FGD with young adults aged 18-24, the FGD process with participants under-18 required as interesting as possible. We slightly modified the FGD methods to ensure the participant engaged in the 3-hour FGD process. Starting the introduction with an interesting one, where each person introduced themselves through hand claps mentioning their names and favourite things, this process quite successfully maintained the participant’s mood.

The FGD process was divided into three discussion sessions: orientation and city introduction, discussion on actions they have taken, and lastly, on the use of digital tools. Before starting the discussion, we began to introduce our organisation, Kota Kita, explained the research and consent form, and the reasons why we invited them for the discussion. The discussion session began by inviting participants to get to know their cities, Solo and Denpasar, by asking several questions about the city: where are the public spaces, who is your mayor, and other prompting questions aimed at providing them with an understanding of the city and to see how familiar they are with their city.

What interests and concerns young people about their cities?

The session then continued with small group discussions to further discuss urban issues that participants are concerned with and the key actions that they are already taking. We were encouraged with the results of this topic discussion both in Solo and Denpasar, where young people of that age could articulate their concerns about the city and the actions they are taking very well. Although not all of them are already involved in collective actions, some of them have been paying attention and doing something in the city.

Regarding the use of digital tools, especially social media, they are the age group that is quite active on social media. During the discussion, they even mentioned having two to four Instagram accounts, each with different types of engagement and purposes. It was interesting to see how they could specify the use of social media based on the engagement purposes they wanted. Specific social media for specific purposes, something we need to think about going forward, how co-production of digital tools is something that is close to their daily activities, can support them, as well as increase their participation in the city.