Youth Worker Interactions with Other Sectors: Better Understanding Multi-Agency Working to Support Young People
Youth work is better when its workers regularly interact with other stakeholders. These include workers in mainstream schools, alternative provision, the social care system, criminal justice, mental health and local authority commissioners – among others. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that interactions within integrated services are often absent from the everyday experience of youth workers.
For the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and with our partners, UK Youth, we are researching how professional youth workers interact with other sector personnel and agencies. This will help to design future policy and programmes and may offer guides to good practice and better outcomes.
Through qualitative case studies and an online survey, the research will explore:
- What interactions take place between agencies and why?
- What are the benefits of these interactions – and the implications of not interacting?
- What form do interactions take - how formal or informal are they?
- What are the barriers to greater interaction?
- What lessons can be learned about better multi-agency interactions?
UK Youth are convening a cross-sector advisory group of representatives from youth work, social work, health, education and the criminal justice system, as well as young people themselves, to provide expert advice throughout the study.
For more information, please contact Jo Hutchinson, via jhutchinson@sqw.co.uk.
