Over the past 52 years, Colombia has experienced persistent levels of community violence due to an internal armed conflict and the proliferation of several criminal organizations. Confrontations between rival criminal groups as well as between former guerrilla organizations and the Colombian armed forces have terrorized communities. Despite strong peace-building and community-building efforts, many young Colombians continue to experience poverty, geo-social isolation, lack of educational and employment opportunities, and violence within their families and communities that continue to put them at risk for mental and behavioral problems (McGill & Kane, 2015). In 2018, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) commissioned the American Institutes for Research (AIR), in partnership with Democracy International (DI), under the Latin America and the Caribbean Youth Violence Prevention Project, to examine the current state of violence affecting the most vulnerable youth in Colombia and current policies, programs, and practices in place to mitigate and prevent violence. The assessment took place over a 12-month period, which started with a desk review and interviews with experts and followed these with two community dialogues in each location to listen to and learn from youth experiences with violence. The research team, together with USAID, identified three locations for the study after reviewing data and examining conditions across the country that met USAID’s criteria for persistent high levels of violence: Cali (large urban), Buenaventura (peri-urban), and Caucasia (rural).