Wood, Westwood, and Thompson - Introduction from Youth Work

1 Quote: "For example, youth work is defined in the English National Occupational Standards for professional youth work as '[Enabling] young people to develop holistically, working with them to facilitate their personal, social, and educational development, to enable them to develop their voice, influence and place society and to reach their full potential' (Lifelong Learning UK 2008: 4)."

2 New Ideas:

    a) "Most youth work takes place in the context of social injustice, often with young people and others who are on the margins, excluded by a number of personal, cultural and structural barriers."

    b) "The character of a youth worker, their integrity and their willingness to act as a role model and critical friend are vital... youth workers can be heard describing their work with 'young offenders', 'teenage parents' and 'NEETs' (Not in Education, Employment, or Training)... using these labels to describe young people with whom we work should be resisted at all costs."

3 Key Vocabulary Words:

    - Holistic Development: the social, emotional, physical, mental, and intellectual growth of a person

    - Informal Education: A general term for education that can occur outside of a traditional lecture or school based learning systems

    - Pro-social Modeling: The ways in which individuals working with involuntary clients can model and reinforce pro-social values to elicit similar values in their clients

        ↳ Examples of pro-social behaviors:
            1. Attending appointments/classes and being punctual
            2. Being hopeful and confident in progress towards goals and achievements
            3. Politeness, kindness, empathy
            4. Associations from non-criminal peers
            5. Following orders and directions from staff

CONNECTION: "Youth workers purposefully intervene in young people's lives, creating opportunities, activities and conversations that aim to enable young people to think, feel and act differently towards their social world."

➜ I spent a lot of my high school days at an afterschool program called New Urban Arts (NUA). At first, it wasn't easy forming bonds and relationships with the mentors because truthfully, I didn't care about anything other than working on my own art projects and hanging out with my friends there. I would often get annoyed whenever a mentor would try and talk to me while I was with my friends or working on a project because most of the time they only wanted to promote an upcoming event or internship opportunity. I always ignored them until I started to really think about it--how good could these events and internships really be? I decided to actually take a look into them and started to attend the events, and I actually found myself having a lot of fun. Even though I had no interest at first, I also signed up for an internship. Reading this document and this quote made me realize that the mentors repeatedly coming up to me to talk about the events and internships was definitely on purpose, even if they could sense my annoyance. I can say confidently that the mentors at NUA are only intervening to help open up new opportunities for you and welcoming you in to create close bonds with them.