So.. the weekend is finally here and it's been interesting talking with young people about what youth work means to them! (or not because I spent most of the week dealing with serious issues while my staff team spoke to young people)
Thursday & Friday have been much quieter than the start of my week mainly with catching up on paperwork and helping public health with the survey a day in the life of.... speaking to young people about what their life looks like.
Looking back at the theme of this years National Youth Work Week 'youth work for today and tomorrow' I realise how much things have changed in the 16 years I've been a youth worker. I've seen Local Authority Youth Work grow with YOF funding to develop innovative ideas and projects, pretty much anything young people can come up with...and then shrink again with cuts, closures and complete repurposing.
I work with a range of young people who are amazing but while many have an iPhone in their hand and all kinds of potential, their self belief and aspirations are not what they should be. They aren't interested in helping others as they feel no one is interested in helping them (which is a real bug bear of mine but save that for another day!!) and they feel there is no hope for them. This then comes out in the form of panic attacks, self harm, self destructive behaviour such as drug taking.
So bearing all this in mind our newly formed 'targeted' service has a pretty big target audience!!!
Friday 10 November 2017
Wednesday 8 November 2017
Wednesday 8th of November 2017
7am-Try to get out of bed and walk dog but after 2 long days decide to just give up and save that til lunch time.
9am-Head into office to drop off Fareshare Food Cloud and check on progress for Yoga training later in the month.
11am-Arrive home and decide to do 'just a little work'...
1pm-Realise the little work has took too long so head out to walk dog then head down to the allotment.
4pm-Head back to work to start getting ready for evening session get distracted by young people who've turned up for their football training and need somewhere to 'doss'.
6pm-Staff start arriving (hope for quiet night!)
6:15pm-More staff arrive and be informed it won't be a quiet night!!!
6:30pm-Open session, sign in 53 young people, discuss issues from previous week and start activities
7:20pm-Realise some young people are struggling to behave and discuss with staff.
7:50pm-Have full on argument with a group of young people who've been warned that I will be ringing parents if issues carry on, ring dad, get young person grounded, feel bad!!
8:30pm-Club finally finishes pack up and discuss issues with attitude and manners and where the line is between being a teenager and being rude
9pm-Visit local shop where young people have been hanging around while waiting to be picked up, no ASB issues this week, WIN!!
10pm-Arrive home and blog away...
Thursday 9th & Friday 10th November
9am-Head into office to drop off Fareshare Food Cloud and check on progress for Yoga training later in the month.
11am-Arrive home and decide to do 'just a little work'...
1pm-Realise the little work has took too long so head out to walk dog then head down to the allotment.
4pm-Head back to work to start getting ready for evening session get distracted by young people who've turned up for their football training and need somewhere to 'doss'.
6pm-Staff start arriving (hope for quiet night!)
6:15pm-More staff arrive and be informed it won't be a quiet night!!!
6:30pm-Open session, sign in 53 young people, discuss issues from previous week and start activities
7:20pm-Realise some young people are struggling to behave and discuss with staff.
7:50pm-Have full on argument with a group of young people who've been warned that I will be ringing parents if issues carry on, ring dad, get young person grounded, feel bad!!
8:30pm-Club finally finishes pack up and discuss issues with attitude and manners and where the line is between being a teenager and being rude
9pm-Visit local shop where young people have been hanging around while waiting to be picked up, no ASB issues this week, WIN!!
10pm-Arrive home and blog away...
Thursday 9th & Friday 10th November
Tuesday 7th of November
8am-Pack and set off to work. I have a plan and I'm sticking to it!!
8:30am-Arrive at work and meet caretakers to discuss delivery of our donated outdoor table tennis table that was part of a project in the town centre.
9:30am-Realise table is not going to arrive in time and have to ring school to inform one to one... table then arrives.
10.05am-Meet One to Ones, copy up notes, travel...lots.
1:30pm-Decide I am not willing to wait for food to cook as I am starving so buy a jacket potato.
2pm-Rush up to other centre for C-card drop in which had to be delayed due to the arrival of football teams worth of primary school children who were locked out of the school and desperate for the toilet.
4pm-Catch up on back logged notes then start prep for evening session.
7pm- Senior club (13-19years) starts, over 45 young people in centre and a number more outside. NON of the activities went down well with young people and we had a number of new members. Eat a wrap while walking around centre dealing with behaviour and new members forms.
8pm- Committee meeting. Discuss trip ideas for Christmas rewards, take over day, issues with behaviour in the centre and people being more actively involved.
9pm-Session finished, pack up debrief (notice random palpitations) head off to collect Fareshare foodcloud donations from Tescos.
10pm-head to drop off dog food picked up earlier in the day when passing shop at Grandmas (scare her half to death!)
11pm sit down to write blog while dog sits and whines because she hasn't had enough attention today
...AND BREATHE!!
Wednesday 8th November
Thursday 9th & Friday 10th November
8:30am-Arrive at work and meet caretakers to discuss delivery of our donated outdoor table tennis table that was part of a project in the town centre.
9:30am-Realise table is not going to arrive in time and have to ring school to inform one to one... table then arrives.
10.05am-Meet One to Ones, copy up notes, travel...lots.
1:30pm-Decide I am not willing to wait for food to cook as I am starving so buy a jacket potato.
2pm-Rush up to other centre for C-card drop in which had to be delayed due to the arrival of football teams worth of primary school children who were locked out of the school and desperate for the toilet.
4pm-Catch up on back logged notes then start prep for evening session.
7pm- Senior club (13-19years) starts, over 45 young people in centre and a number more outside. NON of the activities went down well with young people and we had a number of new members. Eat a wrap while walking around centre dealing with behaviour and new members forms.
8pm- Committee meeting. Discuss trip ideas for Christmas rewards, take over day, issues with behaviour in the centre and people being more actively involved.
9pm-Session finished, pack up debrief (notice random palpitations) head off to collect Fareshare foodcloud donations from Tescos.
10pm-head to drop off dog food picked up earlier in the day when passing shop at Grandmas (scare her half to death!)
11pm sit down to write blog while dog sits and whines because she hasn't had enough attention today
...AND BREATHE!!
Wednesday 8th November
Thursday 9th & Friday 10th November
Monday 6th November 2017
8:30am-Arrive at Main office look over 2 page A4 todo list and decide not to start with that!! Complete timesheets and absence returns, respond to e-mails from Friday. Get distracted by work man needing to get into building. Try to help another member of team with an IT issues before realising you can't fix it and giving up!
10am-Operations meeting. We usually discuss the ins and outs of our week catch up on progress with one to ones and discuss any concerns, training needs upcoming events such as Take Over Week.
12pm-Second meeting of day about setting up a new girls group project. After going round the houses with a number of ideas final settle on an amazing idea (watch this space!!!)
1pm-Start sorting through Fareshare. While I hate how time consuming this job can be I love working with this organisation! We are lucky enough to receive donations from Fareshare which helps feed young people at our centres and over the past 3 years I have noticed much more feeding of our young people compared to previous years where it was snacking.
3pm-Head over to other centre via supermarket to buy rest of resources for the week ahead, unpack, catch up with Targeted Information Advice and Guidance (TIAG) Worker about young people who have been trying to reach me. Make calls to some parents re: one to ones.
6pm-Head back to main office to drop off resources for evening session then head home for some Dinner!
8pm- As I am not working at the centre tonight I have a chance to prep for my one to ones the following day finish clearing my inbox and head home at 9:30pm
Tuesday 7th November
Wednesday 8th November
10am-Operations meeting. We usually discuss the ins and outs of our week catch up on progress with one to ones and discuss any concerns, training needs upcoming events such as Take Over Week.
12pm-Second meeting of day about setting up a new girls group project. After going round the houses with a number of ideas final settle on an amazing idea (watch this space!!!)
1pm-Start sorting through Fareshare. While I hate how time consuming this job can be I love working with this organisation! We are lucky enough to receive donations from Fareshare which helps feed young people at our centres and over the past 3 years I have noticed much more feeding of our young people compared to previous years where it was snacking.
3pm-Head over to other centre via supermarket to buy rest of resources for the week ahead, unpack, catch up with Targeted Information Advice and Guidance (TIAG) Worker about young people who have been trying to reach me. Make calls to some parents re: one to ones.
6pm-Head back to main office to drop off resources for evening session then head home for some Dinner!
8pm- As I am not working at the centre tonight I have a chance to prep for my one to ones the following day finish clearing my inbox and head home at 9:30pm
Tuesday 7th November
Wednesday 8th November
Sunday 5 November 2017
Welcome to National Youth Work Week 2017
So roughly 3 years ago for national youth work week I decided to do a blog chronicling a day in the life of a Youth Worker.
It was interested to look over those thoughts this week particularly with this years Youth Work week theme of 'Today and Tomorrow'.
In 2014 our service had undergone a restructure, I had more responsibility managing 2 youth centres and 18 members of staff and we became on open access service... 3 years later though and we are now a targeted provision working as part of the early help agenda.
I still manage 2 centres but they aren't youth clubs (they stopped being youth clubs when the leader of the Council went of nationally TV and announced the closure of all our centres.)
I see my job as wearing 3 different hats;
The first is a case worker doing one to ones with young people who could have a range of needs from problems at home, ASB, anger management, anxiety, low self esteem.
The second is a group work leader working in schools or with pupils during school time. Usually groups may be again looking at anger management (I know not everyone likes that term), stress management, environmental work with young people who otherwise struggle in school.
The third role is similar to the traditional Youth Worker. While we make an effort to target those who most need our service, we never turn a young person away who needs support (unless they trash the building, that usually gets them banned at least for a while!)
So... the question is how different is an average day now compared to 3 years ago!??!
Well keep reading this week!!
Monday 6th November
Tuesday 7th November
Wednesday 8th November
Thursday 9th & Friday 10th November
It was interested to look over those thoughts this week particularly with this years Youth Work week theme of 'Today and Tomorrow'.
In 2014 our service had undergone a restructure, I had more responsibility managing 2 youth centres and 18 members of staff and we became on open access service... 3 years later though and we are now a targeted provision working as part of the early help agenda.
I still manage 2 centres but they aren't youth clubs (they stopped being youth clubs when the leader of the Council went of nationally TV and announced the closure of all our centres.)
I see my job as wearing 3 different hats;
The first is a case worker doing one to ones with young people who could have a range of needs from problems at home, ASB, anger management, anxiety, low self esteem.
The second is a group work leader working in schools or with pupils during school time. Usually groups may be again looking at anger management (I know not everyone likes that term), stress management, environmental work with young people who otherwise struggle in school.
The third role is similar to the traditional Youth Worker. While we make an effort to target those who most need our service, we never turn a young person away who needs support (unless they trash the building, that usually gets them banned at least for a while!)
So... the question is how different is an average day now compared to 3 years ago!??!
Well keep reading this week!!
Monday 6th November
Tuesday 7th November
Wednesday 8th November
Thursday 9th & Friday 10th November
Friday 7 November 2014
Friday 7th of November 2014
I decided to make today my last post. While Youth Work Week continues until Sunday, my working week has now finished. This particular week because I did 3 long days I'm not in today though I've sat down finally after a hectic day catching up on housework, and preparing for rainbows and I still find myself looking through volunteer roles and staffing over the next week as well as looking closely at my diary to work out next week's hours.
While I have enjoyed blogging this week there are so many more aspects of our job. We manage buildings, budgets, staff, targeted projects in schools, and then in the evenings we run open sessions in buildings or we do street based work in places like parks and areas that may sometimes have Anti Social Behaviour, working with groups to discuss issues like sexual health drugs and alcohol and also trying to help them be more involved in their communities whether thats decision making or finding something for them to do. My young people are also keen fundraisers and enjoy putting on events for the community.
It's the variety in the work that I find the most interesting, from the fun parties and trips to the times when you are genuinely helping young people with anger management, sexual health advice and more often than not helping shape their future selves.
I would appreciate it if for today's post, you guys who are reading this! If you have ever had been worked with my Youth Workers whether paid or volunteers, I would love to see a comment about what you feel they did for you.
and if you would like to read more about what youth work is see the NYA and also this infed article gives a bit of info about the role.
Thanks again everyone for reading!
While I have enjoyed blogging this week there are so many more aspects of our job. We manage buildings, budgets, staff, targeted projects in schools, and then in the evenings we run open sessions in buildings or we do street based work in places like parks and areas that may sometimes have Anti Social Behaviour, working with groups to discuss issues like sexual health drugs and alcohol and also trying to help them be more involved in their communities whether thats decision making or finding something for them to do. My young people are also keen fundraisers and enjoy putting on events for the community.
It's the variety in the work that I find the most interesting, from the fun parties and trips to the times when you are genuinely helping young people with anger management, sexual health advice and more often than not helping shape their future selves.
I would appreciate it if for today's post, you guys who are reading this! If you have ever had been worked with my Youth Workers whether paid or volunteers, I would love to see a comment about what you feel they did for you.
and if you would like to read more about what youth work is see the NYA and also this infed article gives a bit of info about the role.
Thanks again everyone for reading!
Thursday 6 November 2014
Thursday 6th November 2014
After the manic start to the beginning of the week by Thursday I usually have a few quiet days left to my week. Luckily today I get a later start so I can chill out with the dog before work.
11am-I've had a few e-mails since a last got chance to check yesterday so I start of my morning replying and have a glance over my to do list. Usually Thursday/Friday are my get your head down and work days as I don't have many groups of young people on those days. Today I decided to tackle our Volunteer Job Descriptions. We've had young people volunteer at the centre for a number of years now but each year we have more interest. Many of our members are doing a local award in volunteering. To complete this they need to completed a training course about child protection, working with others and many more skills. They also set themselves targets and goals. Other young people are completed their Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme and choose to volunteer with us. Over the past few weeks we've had too many people for roles that we had, so as a staff team we sat down the other week and thought of some tasks that staff could support young people to complete such as staffing the coffee bar area, helping send out letters, running sports activities, and running the committee.
12pm-Every Thursday during term time I work with a school group which are part of a PRU (Pupil Referral Unit). The are only a small team which means they don't get to have as many facilities as bigger schools may have so for a bit of a treat and in exchange for me 'informally educating them' for some of the time they call in to the centre. Many of the pupils who attend are in between other schools for many different reasons, usually its a bit like being a piece of a jigsaw that would fit better elsewhere. Today we I gave them a 5 minute run through of my 'alcohol on the brain' activity explain how it affects your brain as you drink more and more. We then did a bit of crafts and games and discussed doing some baking next week for Children in Need.
1:30pm-With so much stuff going off earlier this week, I now need to chase up many other projects and after a chat about girls groups, pop up shops and more volunteer opportunities I head over to the other centre with a load of resources for the evening.
4pm-Couple more meetings this afternoon about progressing some projects and I finally head out of work for the day....
Now usually I've been talking about work stuff so I'd finish there but Thursdays when I'm not needed elsewhere at work I am a Guide/Senior Section leader. I've been in the guiding movement since I was 8 and where possible like to help out, sadly I ended up letting the girls down a bit this week as a ran out of time to sort the activity I hoped to do but I did find a nice giant poppy activity (I'll add the link incase anyone wants to give it a go!)
6:30pm Arrive at Guides and set group off making poppies while pointing out how they best not make a mess as the Rainbows, with whom I'll be doing a similar activity tomorrow, are amazingly good at tidying up and they are 5yrs old!
7:30pm-Break off to chat with one of the Young Leaders about how she is doing at Brownies with her qualification and sign some paperwork.
8pm- Return to guides to find double sided tape stuck to tables and white scraps of paper all over the floor and proceed to lecture them about how I had high hopes for them, while showing them pictures of the Rainbows and there fantastic ability to do things. (better luck next week girls!)
10pm-While writing blog post consider setting up a competition between Guides and Rainbows to see who is the best at tidying up, the 5-7 year olds or the 10-14yr olds!??!?
Links:
http://www.marthastewart.com/270577/giant-paper-poppy-flower-decoration
http://www.nya.org.uk/supporting-youth-work/youth-work-week/
11am-I've had a few e-mails since a last got chance to check yesterday so I start of my morning replying and have a glance over my to do list. Usually Thursday/Friday are my get your head down and work days as I don't have many groups of young people on those days. Today I decided to tackle our Volunteer Job Descriptions. We've had young people volunteer at the centre for a number of years now but each year we have more interest. Many of our members are doing a local award in volunteering. To complete this they need to completed a training course about child protection, working with others and many more skills. They also set themselves targets and goals. Other young people are completed their Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme and choose to volunteer with us. Over the past few weeks we've had too many people for roles that we had, so as a staff team we sat down the other week and thought of some tasks that staff could support young people to complete such as staffing the coffee bar area, helping send out letters, running sports activities, and running the committee.
12pm-Every Thursday during term time I work with a school group which are part of a PRU (Pupil Referral Unit). The are only a small team which means they don't get to have as many facilities as bigger schools may have so for a bit of a treat and in exchange for me 'informally educating them' for some of the time they call in to the centre. Many of the pupils who attend are in between other schools for many different reasons, usually its a bit like being a piece of a jigsaw that would fit better elsewhere. Today we I gave them a 5 minute run through of my 'alcohol on the brain' activity explain how it affects your brain as you drink more and more. We then did a bit of crafts and games and discussed doing some baking next week for Children in Need.
1:30pm-With so much stuff going off earlier this week, I now need to chase up many other projects and after a chat about girls groups, pop up shops and more volunteer opportunities I head over to the other centre with a load of resources for the evening.
4pm-Couple more meetings this afternoon about progressing some projects and I finally head out of work for the day....
Now usually I've been talking about work stuff so I'd finish there but Thursdays when I'm not needed elsewhere at work I am a Guide/Senior Section leader. I've been in the guiding movement since I was 8 and where possible like to help out, sadly I ended up letting the girls down a bit this week as a ran out of time to sort the activity I hoped to do but I did find a nice giant poppy activity (I'll add the link incase anyone wants to give it a go!)
6:30pm Arrive at Guides and set group off making poppies while pointing out how they best not make a mess as the Rainbows, with whom I'll be doing a similar activity tomorrow, are amazingly good at tidying up and they are 5yrs old!
7:30pm-Break off to chat with one of the Young Leaders about how she is doing at Brownies with her qualification and sign some paperwork.
8pm- Return to guides to find double sided tape stuck to tables and white scraps of paper all over the floor and proceed to lecture them about how I had high hopes for them, while showing them pictures of the Rainbows and there fantastic ability to do things. (better luck next week girls!)
10pm-While writing blog post consider setting up a competition between Guides and Rainbows to see who is the best at tidying up, the 5-7 year olds or the 10-14yr olds!??!?
Links:
http://www.marthastewart.com/270577/giant-paper-poppy-flower-decoration
http://www.nya.org.uk/supporting-youth-work/youth-work-week/
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