This Ignite presentation presents a method for using transcripts from audio recordings of youth-adult meetings to assess pre-post changes in youth 21st Century or soft skill processes that represent critical thinking. Presentation Abstract: The need to develop youth 21st Century skills, or “soft skills” such as problem-solving, critical thinking, management, and collaboration, has captured the interests of diverse groups, including researchers, practitioners, policymakers, and the business community. Youth-serving organizations, particularly those emphasizing leadership development and youth-adult partnerships, are proposed to have the potential to develop these skills; however, assessing 21st Century skills in valid and reliable ways has been a challenge for evaluators. We describe a process for measuring youth 21st Century skills through observing, transcribing, and coding naturally occurring youth-adult meetings and present data showing change in youth 21st Century skills following an intervention designed to strengthen meaningful youth presence in organizational management.#softskills #HowTo #YouthFocusedEvaluation #2012Conference #methods #observations