Towards a nested model of Youth Work.

By Dr Dean Farquhar and Michael McKenna.

The quality of engagement in youth work projects has long been a central concern for practitioners, researchers and policymakers. Much work has been undertaken formulating principles of practice aimed at ensuring appropriate provision and developing evaluative techniques well-suited to measuring impact. Collectively, this work forms a contested conceptual terrain that youth workers must negotiate in order to legitimate their practice. This paper provides a synthesis of aspects of this work that is conceptually robust and practically useful. The paper delineates a practitioners’ ethos, explains its significance and sets out the merits of visualizing the process it aspires to through a nested model. This will equip youth workers with an additional tool to communicate the values-based and process-driven nature of their practice.  

The nested model brings together past and present insights into the nature of youth work practice and challenges workers to question taken-for-granted practices. 

You can read the full article here  

Sacred Space; An exploration into the Distinctiveness of Faith-based Youth Work from a Christian Perspective in Northern Ireland.

By Dr Mark McFeeters

This article presents a synopsis of a PhD research study undertaken between 2016 and 2023. The project sought to understand the experiences of young people and youth workers engaged in faith-based youth work in Northern Ireland. it is important to explore the role faith-based youth work plays in the UK and N. Ireland (Stanton 2013; Macaulay 2006) and to consider its purpose, values, and approach through the eyes of those experiencing it. By exploring these experiences, the research sought to understand the influence of the Christian faith in faith-based practice, the purpose, and the process of faith-based youth work. 

You can read the full article here  

Relationships:

the heart of mentoring. 

Lessons from Extern's mentoring programmes on what young people value in having a mentor.

By Dr Gail Neill and Dr Mark Hammond

We often hear of mentoring approaches being used within youth work settings but what this looks like in practice is often very different. Meaning that when we talk of mentoring, we may be on very different pages - from informal befriending type meet ups and check ins, through to more formalised and objective orientated short-term engagements.  

Throughout 2022 we had the pleasure of engaging with mentors, peer mentors and young people at Extern. The aim being, to help the organisation reflect on their use of mentoring, considering how mentors understood this work and capturing what young people found beneficial within these engagements. Through a series of focus groups, what we found was that despite the formal outcomes of the programmes, it was often the relationships and informal connections between the young person and the mentor that was of the greatest benefit and that was most commonly discussed.  

You can read the full report here  

‘It’s just what happens’: Girls’ and young women’s views and experiences of violence in Northern Ireland

By Dr Siobhan McAlister & Dr Gail Neill

In 2022, academics from the Centre for Children’s Rights, Queen’s University Belfast (Siobhan McAlister, Dirk Schubotz and Michelle Templeton), and the Centre for Youth Research and Dialogue, Ulster University (Gail Neill) were commissioned by The Executive Office to undertake research with girls and young women to inform Northern Ireland’s first Strategy to End Violence Against Women and Girls.

Through an online survey, focus groups and one-to-one interviews, 268 girls and young women participated in the research. The research examined young women’s understandings and experiences of violence, their view on the causes and consequences of violence, and their views on services and supports and on how violence against women and girls might be prevented.

The title of the report, ‘Its just what happens’, reflects the sense among many girls and young women that violence was so pervasive as to be normal, and the view that there was little that could be done about it. The research identified ways in which age and gender intersect to influence the particular experiences of girls and young women and their willingness and ability to report violence.

You can read the full report here