Reflections on Real Talk’s Growth & Serving 8,000 New Teens During Covid-19

We just passed the midpoint of the year and I’m sure I don’t need to remind anyone what a long and challenging year this has been. Our team has certainly felt the weight of it as we tried to navigate the ever-changing circumstances of 2020 and the first half of 2021. We have been reflecting heavily on our mission to help guide us during this period of uncertainty, and today we wanted to share some insights about the evolution of our work over the last couple years.

Where Real Talk Started

When we launched the beta version of Real Talk in 2017, we had an exclusive focus on providing sexual health education. Our team had first-hand experience with the education system and we each saw how young people were left without essential information to support them in making healthy decisions. Our goal with Real Talk was to use storytelling to make sex education more modern, engaging, and effective. 

Lessons Learned

Once Real Talk was out in the world -- and real teens across the U.S. and the world were using it -- we learned that Real Talk’s impact extends far beyond sex education. We got requests time and time again to include stories on more topics like mental health, navigating relationships with friends and family, and how to have difficult conversations. We also saw much greater engagement among LGBTQIA+ teens than we anticipated (though in retrospect, it makes total sense considering Real Talk’s focus on creating safe, judgement free spaces for teens of all identities).

Most importantly, we learned that Real Talk helps teens know they are not alone in their experiences growing up. 

Too often, teens feel like they are the only ones in the world who are experiencing a particular situation. Parents dismiss these concerns as teenage angst (or otherwise don’t know how to talk with their teens about these issues), and social media only amplifies social comparisons, anxiety, and distress. Many teens are left without a safe space to share their experiences, learn, and find support -- and this is why they come to Real Talk.

With all of this in mind, we made the decision in 2018 to expand our focus beyond sex education to explicitly include mental health and LGBTQIA+ identity-related topics as part of our content strategy. We updated our theory of change, called on mental health and LGBTQIA+ experts in our network to help design new story prompts, and searched for new online resources to ensure we could properly support teens across all these topic areas.

Where Real Talk Is Now

When the pandemic hit in early 2020, we already had tools in place to address the overwhelming need for mental health support among youth that soon occurred. We are committed to providing young people with the support they need to be happy and healthy, whether that is through sexual health resources, mental health support, or simply a safe space where they can be embraced as their full selves. 

Since the pandemic started in March 2020, we have:

• Served over 8,000 new Real Talk users,

• Received over 2,100 story submissions, and

• Connected youth with more than 4,000 online resources

But we know this is just a fraction of the potential impact we can have. Real Talk is needed more than ever to help this generation of adolescents cope with the traumatic experiences of the last 16 months. 

Learn More On Our New Website

We invite you to learn more about our new theory of change, our impact to date, and how to get involved with our work by visiting our new website. Real Talk has grown so much over the years and we are excited to more clearly share our history and impact through this new website. We would love for you to take a look and share feedback with us.

Finally, thank you to all of you -- our work throughout the years is made possible through the generous support of our partners, funders, and stakeholders. Your continuing support will allow us to have an even greater impact on Covid-19 recovery efforts.

In this together, 

Cristina & the Real Talk team

P.S. There are lots of ways to support our work further – whether through financial support or partnering with us to bring Real Talk to teens in your community. Email us with any inquiries at founders@realtalkapp.com