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2017, Community Development
AI
Fusco compiles insights from diverse authors addressing the undervaluation of youth work and its practitioners, focusing on the evolution of youth work as a distinct field. Highlighting trends from the "out of school time" movement to community school growth, the book prompts critical questions about youth work's legitimacy, training competencies, and evaluation methods. Perspectives from international contributors deepen understanding of youth work contexts, delivering a reflective view on the current state and future directions of the discipline.
SCHOLE: A Journal of Leisure Studies and Recreation Education, 2005
In this article I reflect upon how the ambiguity of definition which surrounded Community Education in the 1970s and 1980s has had direct consequences for Youth Work in Scotland at the beginning of the twenty-first century. By looking back at what practitioners said then about their profession, I will demonstrate how this vagueness has continued to influence definitions of Youth Work, and its practice up until the present time. In hope, I go on to suggest that two recent notable occurrences have created an opportunity to redress this situation. They have, I suggest, the potential to reconnect Youth Work with its underpinning philosophy and ethos, and to develop confident practitioners, capable of engaging confidently and proactively with inter-disciplinary approaches to working with young people. It was first published in A Journal Of Youth Work: Research and Positive Practices in Work with Young People in 2011
2016
The contribution of the youth in the development of the local communities has been a well preserved asset all over the world’s nations. However, the support given to this category of people and the potential of them has, and sometimes still is, not exploited to the maximum. Youth work is an old profession but the professionalization is yet a new concept, under continuous construction, in order to meet the rapid development of the youth in such a way that the youth workers can constantly be the pillars the youth can lie on and which can support and promote the impactful work the youth are conducting. In this context the present article aims to highlight both theoretical and practical aspects of youth work by presenting the development of the profession and by illustrating impactful activities of youth in their communities as best practice examples.
It is useful in terms of setting a particular focus for supervision to establish some of the similarities and differences between youth work, social work other forms of intervention into the experience of youth. However, it seems more positive to provide a clear statement about the character of youth work (although not a definitive root and branch explanation, as this would preclude as much youth work as it might encompass). In this chapter I have not sought to demarcate barriers between what is and what is not youth work. What I have sought to do is draw out some of the distinctive elements that might distinguish any particular incarnation or profile of youth work practice and include some brief indications of how this might develop and evolve. This is done to denote a basic direction for supervision in this field. The social work or teacher reader might note both common and distinctive ground, but on the whole recognise some of the elemental connections relevant to what might be thought of as a generic supervisory outlook.
2015
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission in writing of the copyright holder. For rights of translation or reproduction, applications should be made to Edinburgh Youth Work Consortium. This research is a small (but beautifully shaped) pebble in a large pool. We believe that the ripples will be felt by many, and there's a chance that they create a wave that will shape the way young people experience and benefit from youth work in the years to come.
Youth Studies Australia, 1997
This paper aims to establish some core understandings of the practice of youth work and some of the ethical considerations that follow. The conception of power, and the nature of the power relationship between young poeple and workers is explored, along with the often conflicting expectations that come from funding bodies, communities, management and other professionals. We also discuss the contribution that understanding youth work as a profession might make to practice, as well as some of the difficulties.
The current formulation of European Union youth policy is not sufficient for a full understanding of what distinguishes youth work from other services or educational practice for young people. Youth work in Europe has a diverse range of fields, goals, and methods of intervention. Such diversification is considered one of the strengths of youth work, inasmuch as it is associated with its ability to adapt to the variety of problems it faces. Such flexibility is, however, likely to generate vagueness in terms of the knowledge of the special contribution expected from youth work and its execution. As a contribution to lead evaluation research to produce empirical evidence about the key-features of youth work, a theoretical framework is presented in this paper that help to identify the peculiar expected outcomes of youth work as well as those mechanisms able to generate them. Specifically, this paper focused on the ability of youth work to affect a more equal distribution of personal development opportunities for the young outside the formal education. For this purpose, sociological theories on non-formal education, educational inequalities and youth participation have been intertwined with psychological research on transition from adolescence to adulthood and with the theory of educational accompaniment in social pedagogy.
Thinking Seriously About Youth Work, 2017
Chapter in Thinking Seriously About Youth Work
Commonwealth Youth and Development
There are many youth workers who continue to design their interventions without any theoretical basis, despite a long history of youth work as a field of practice. The aim of this article is to present selected ideologies and theoretical frameworks underpinning youth work practice. These ideologies and theories, although predominantly borrowed from other disciplines, provide insight on how youth work should be practised.Based on a thorough literature review, the authors have selected different theories and ideologies that youth workers, like other professionals, are expected to know, understand and to adapt to youth work practice. These theories are important and would serve as theoretical frameworks on which youth work interventions will be based and, thereby, provide youth workers with the means to predict and analyse the situations of young people from different viewpoints to enable the development of different strategies to address relevant problems.The article concludes that th...
Youth Work: Histories, Policy and Contexts, 2015
New directions for youth development, 2006
Being an effective and intentional youth practitioner involves more than planning. It includes being able to react intelligently to the many difficult situations that arise. Practitioners in out-of-school and after-school settings regularly confront complex dilemmas that emerge in their daily work. They face situations where competing objectives, values, and warrants come into conflict, situations that can pit the developmental needs of youth, ethical concerns, administrative requirements, and other considerations against each other. Using examples from their research that weigh professional and personal judgments, the authors illustrate the complexity of these practice dilemmas and the considerations program staff included as they responded to these challenging situations.
2014
Despite years of experience and development, youth work in the UK remains a profession that is misunderstood, under-appreciated and lacks recognition. There has always been uncertainty around the professional definition or articulation of the role of a youth worker. Not only is there a societal lack of understanding about the role but there is also an intrinsic lack of ability to explain the role by those actually undertaking it. Often when social landscapes shift, so too do our attitudes and values, suggesting that perhaps we must acknowledge that the role of the youth worker might also change. Questions need to be asked as to whether Youth and Community Work can make effective enough shifts to survive or whether rebranding and repackaging is required.
Michael Emslie argues that the time is right for youth work in Australia to be professionalised in line with other human service practices such as nursing, education and psychology. He identifies a groundswell of activities that support the professionalisation of youth work and a concurrent growth in high-level interest in strengthening social and community services. He argues that this context presents an opportune time to professionalise youth work. Emslie provides reasons why it is imperative to regulate and monitor the youth sector as a profession, and explains how professionalisation will help address the critical shortage of qualified youth practitioners and also improve the quality of service young people receive.
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