Youth Work Online: identifying the training needs

[Tim Davies]

What do you think the biggest training and learning needs are in your service when it comes to digital technologies?

I'm in the middle of some work to develop a series of potential training sessions / courses and resources to help services working with young people to take steps towards improving their online engagement and youth work.

My goal is to try and pilot and develop a range of training options by October this year (when I'll be returning to full time study), and then to offer as many as possible as toolkits for services to use for in-house training, or as possible training-the-trainers resources.

The current ideas I'm working on are listed below - but I would really appreciate your input. Are these the sorts of training options you're interested in?

• Safe & effective engagement with social networks for youth sector practitioners - a one-day session that covers: understanding social media & social networking; pro-actively addressing safety concerns; exploring how social networking can be used by youth professionals and services for young people; and a strategy & skills session looking at building forward plans for an organisation.
• Workshop: Hands on with social media - a full day or half-day session that starts with an overview of a wide range of social media tools and then offers participants a chance to get hands-on and learn to use new tools - ranging from blogging and twitter, to video making and podcasting. Each hands-on session will also address key issues of safety & sustainability.
• Becoming a social media aware organisation - an organisational change training, workshop and development programme helping address all aspects of engagement with social media - including mentoring & support for leaders and managers, and consultancy support to develop policies and strategies.

What's missing? Or what sorts of training & support would be most interesting for your service?

[Hilary Mason]

Hi Tim, All these would be useful. I think part of our main issues at the moment really start with the 1st and 3rd topic areas but within all of this is avtually having the facilities etc to be able to implement a strategy. If I give an example, we are currently putting together our Social Media strategy alongside using digital media to enhance and stretch our work. However part of the strategy has to include how we will deliver this in a LA setting where just getting the computers and networks for youth work staff is hard enough. We are putting together a reasonably indepth survey to actually see what we have available to young people for use by them in our centres.

However info on areas 1 and 2 would be key and any shared practice you currently have would be great.

Hope this helps
Hilary

[Tim Davies]

Hey Hilary

That's really useful. It's the picture that is definitely coming across clearing from just about everywhere...

Perhaps a focus in (3) needs to be on 'using what you've got' - as it can be easy for us to talk about the flashiest things, but without really building on the existing assets hiding away in cupboards etc. out there...

Tim

[Hilary Mason]

Hi Tim

That would work, it's more or less what we are aiming to do. We are also looking at how, as well as skilling up youth workers, we can involve young people in delivering and supporting staff to work in this area. This seems to be a really useful way of ensuring an increased impact at user level. That may be something you want to look at, in terms of delivering training to YP and youth workers together so that it is not just youth worker led.
Hilary

[Liesl Conradie]

I think a very important aspect when it comes to providing on-line support and youth work opportunities via social networking sites is to link it clearly to the professional ethics and to include focus on boundary training. In my experience youth workers are keen to use technology to further their youth work. I agree with dana boyd in that digital youth workers are needed, what is needed with this is a clear linkage with boundaries and professional ethics. This does become a grey issue for youth workers who still get confused between professional and personal boundaries. This is a very real issue for people in the caring professions and especially for one that is now trying to professionalise after a more 'relaxed' start.

[Hilary Mason]

I'd absolutely agree with this having just issued a notice of instruction to all our youth work staff that they should not use their personal profiles to interact with young people, and this goes further than SNS.

[Leah Williams]

I'm not your target audience, but am also looking into training for the organisations I work with (women's organisations). I think having hands-on sessions plus more strategic sessions is a great idea. They sound like sensible ideas to me. I find that organisations often need quite a lot of hand-holding until they get enough confidence - and then it's all fine.

Also, I agree with the approach you suggest about 'starting where you are' or with what you have. Often people think they'll have to get loads of new tools or toys to get started, when it's more about an attitude of openness and communication.

[Kieran Watson]

This question explores a modern and new millennium IT industry that exploits public information and markets personnel details to generate business outcomes. Also, question motives and benefits to corner consumer spending power, based on the voluntary sector being the fastest growing industry, par sa.

Youth organisations depend heavily on service providers and these costs balloon depending on updating and maintain information ect. The concept of social media comes with a cost and the value of social media labour depends on experience, software and services management to provide a quality provision that markets youth provision. Can anyone and/or is somebody working towards standardising projections based on a systematic opportunity to develop online capacity in comparison to Google networking that simplifies general options, support, advice and guidance.

Has the information society dipped their feet into marketing youth as a product and profiling their cash potential?

[Tim Davies]

Hey Kieran

Some interesting questions in here. Perhaps worth starting a new forum thread about?

If I read this correctly - then you are asking two questions:

* Is there already/in development a set of online tools that fit around day-to-day youth work to make youth work better?

* Erm, I'm not quite sure what your second question is asking? What would 'marketing youth as a product' mean? (replying early morning, so it may just be my addled mind - but I think this probably needs a bit more unpacking, unless it is just a restatement of the earlier question...)

[Kieran Watson]

This is a total rabble about our information society in which I give my opinion on how we are failing to get a grasp a hold of a youth culture being a 'market' or 'product' that goes 'hand in hand' with the nature of business, service provision and profiteering to enable a realistic organisational development model.

When considering youth websites on a statutory level I refer to Spired.com in Oxford as a valid youth work tool and reference to youth work delivery to promote positive activities. This information service is fairly broad and non specific towards positive activities timetables, events and reports that are really happening. The feedback from young people is that the positive activities agenda is lacking 'updated' info/issues/incentives/initiatives or/and 'depth' in regards to quality youth work that is inspiring them to get involved. The management of this website must be difficult and something of a problem to maintain and develop as an organisation. The cost of the service and web provider could be a matter of contention, because, in all honesty this could be managed or demonstrate a true youth participation and empowerment project as best practice.

The voluntary sector has taken 'ahold' of their marketing tools and recognise digital/media interaction as a way to promote positive activities within an organisational development plan who's aim is to demonstrate current affairs and project delivery as a promotional tool. I mostly refer to Vinvolved who have serious funding and must be spending a fortune, but, can you recognise any positive activities that are obviously being delivered, offered or encouraged or/and know any 'hard to reach' young people that are involved.

Government has a habit of sub contracting services for young people and this can refer to the British Youth Council who's website is 'hot stuff' and a 'shinning star'. This model of delivery has huge organisational implications and requires lots of resources, provision and facilities to enable it to work. The training programme you desire to establish aims to address some specific techniques that encourage social networking and I recommend your visionary to support online youth work and hope to gain a better understanding of your innovation, understanding and awareness. But, lets forget about the 'big money' and focus on 'shoe string' budgets' that offer simplistic approaches and standardised systems that involve young people's progression, training and development.

[Tim Davies]

Hey Kieran

I would agree that any training needs to equip organisations to work effectively with limited budgets. A strong argument for social media is that it can offer amazing value for money ways of achieving key youth work tasks - providing the skills are in place to use the tools well.

Tim

[Tony Cisse]

Hi all,

Lets discuss this further at the unconference, we can run a session on this. We (at LECP) have the infrastructure to deliver, and have discussed this idea with Tim. It would be great to meet up with any others interested (or who might want to deliver training) on the 11th

Regards

Tony