This weekend, I once again took a trip down the coast to Eastbourne for Youthwork The Conference. As usual, the event was really well organised and I thoroughly enjoyed catching up and connecting with other youth workers.
As part of the conference, on Sunday morning a hosted a one-hour session titled ‘Replacing The Youth Service’. For clarity, the premise was on engaging and encouraging churches (and other orgs) to step in where statutory youth provision has been cut – not to undermine or take-over the existing local authority youth services. To that end, I gave a bit of context to the national situation before explaining the journey we’ve been on locally in re-opening a youth centre alongside Rustington Parish Council, and starting a drop-in with Littlehampton Town Council. We then looked at some of the opportunities and barriers in doing this kind of work. I rather enjoyed myself and want to thank everyone who kindly sat through my ramblings.
For your amusement, I’ve embedded the basic powerpoint below. I’d love to hear your thoughts!
2 responses to “Replacing The Youth Service”
Hi Jon I got a few thoughts on this but in the area of neets or those that are struggling in the current education system.
I will blog on it soon but it’s looking at experienced church members assisting in careers advice and further steps in seeing them get jobs.
Cheers Gary, one of the things that I didn’t really cover in the powerpoint (except in proving evidence) is ensuring QUALITY of work. It’s no use if a bunch of well-intentioned churches do terrible work!
Sounds like you’re building a mentoring service there. Let me know more! 🙂