Youth Workin' It

Consultancy and Resources for Youth Workers and Organizations Worldwide

4 More Areas To Consider When Starting A Youth Group

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Starting a youth group
This isn’t what we meant by a youth group structure

Q: What other things should I consider when starting a youth group?

A: We recently discussed a few things to consider when starting a youth group from scratch. They were your standard ‘grown up’ things to think about, like safety and volunteers. We’re now going to suggest four more creative things to consider once you have the important youth work foundation laid.

I’ll preface this by saying that all of these ideas can (and should) be discussed with youth throughout the planning stages. Most of it can even be delegated to the young people to give them ownership, which will always help a new program thrive.

Mission and Vision

Organizations often have mission and vision statements, but there isn’t anything wrong with having a mission and vision for your individual programs too. ‘Why are you starting the youth group in the first place?’ and ‘What do you hope to accomplish?’ are good questions to answer in your mission and vision statements.

While everything can morph and change over time, it’s a good idea to know where you want to start. Do you want to work with young offenders by supporting their re-entry into society? Would you prefer to start a youth work program for teen mothers? Or provide mentoring for foster care youth? Maybe start a youth club or cafe?

Figuring out the answers to the two ‘Why’ and ‘What’ questions above will ultimately inform the next few areas for consideration and help you structure the youth group.

Activities and Frequency

How often you’re planning to meet might be informed by your availability or that of your venue, but it may also be affected by the youth you’re planning to serve and reach. Teen parents might only be available once a month, while foster care mentors may want to meet weekly.

Once you know how often you hope to meet, you’ll be able to better figure out what kind of activities you’re planning to provide. In the example of a teen parents group, you may want to start meeting once a month for 3 hours – one hour for information and two hours for socializing and a knitting group. On the other hand, mentors meeting with teens once a week might only meet for an hour at a time, play games, talk or learn about things that matter to them in a group setting.

Overview and Plan

So you know who you’re going to work with and how often you plan to meet with them, plus you have a basic idea of some of the activities you’d like to provide. Now it’s time to create a plan for at least the first few months, but possibly up to a year.

Create a plan that naturally flows from one session to the next. For example, if you learned about understanding anger in one session, it might be worth planning the next session on forgiveness.

If you’re new to session planning, you can discover the 5 steps to planning a youth work session here.

Awesomeness

You’ll also want to create the following things with as much awesomeness as you can muster:

These don’t have to be perfect and you may want to get some youth in your program before you choose a name, logo, etc, but it’s a good thing to think about in the early stages of group creation.

Question: There are many other things to think about when starting a youth group from scratch – what are your suggestions? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

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How To Start A Youth Group

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How to start a youth groupQ: I’ve done a lot of volunteer youth work in the past but I’m thinking about starting up a new group for the first time. Do you have any tips on how to start a youth group from scratch?

A: Starting a new youth group may sound like an easy task – get youth together and viola – you have a youth group. But there are a few more things to consider when starting any youth program, be it a youth group, youth project, youth council or any other activity involving groups of youth.

So here are four areas that you need to analyze before you start a new group:

Youth

It’s easy as adults to assume we know what youth want or need. However, it’s always best to ask some first. When you start to see a need for a group, talk to the youth you know or contact local organizations that are working with that population, to find out what their thoughts are about your idea.

If the biggest reason you’re thinking of starting a youth group is because of a lack of local organizations providing support, check online for contacts that might be doing what you want to start or something similar and find out all the information that you can.

Volunteers

You can’t do it alone. Literally. Safe youth group ratios are 1:10 but in a mixed gender group you need one volunteer of each gender as well. Ideally, no matter what the group’s make up, two leaders are your basic requirement for any group of youth no matter the size.

You also won’t be able to do it week in and week out forever. You need to find other adults and older youth who are willing to volunteer in various capacities. Some may only be able to commit to once a quarter, once a month or every week. You’ll be able to care for yourself, your youth and your volunteers better when you have a team of committed people (even if it’s small) before you meet even once.

Venue

You’ll need somewhere to meet. You’ll also need to decide if this is a location that’s just an initial meeting place or if it’s a long-term venue that you can use on an ongoing basis.

Is everyone at the venue on board with the new youth group proposal? You may have the support of the center’s leader, but if the other volunteers providing other services aren’t enthusiastic about youth coming and going in their center, you may find your group times are a lot more stressful.

When considering a venue, think about the transportation needs of your youth. How will they get there? Do the youth drive? Do their parents? A center that’s on the edge of a town that relies heavily on public transport but isn’t near a bus or train stop might not be your best venue, even if it’s free and available.

Safety

I could have put this first, last and everywhere in between. Safety is paramount when planning any youth group, program or activity. Not just the child protection issues, boundaries and youth behavior policies, but the nuts and bolts of keeping youth safe while at the group.

When you’re checking out venues, planning activities and considering transportation, take the time to complete thorough risk assessments. Train your volunteers how to do them as well and make sure you stress the importance of the assessments in their planning and preparation for each session.

These are the basics when you want to start planning a new youth group. Next week we’ll cover four more areas to consider when starting a youth group.

Question: What advice would you give when guiding someone about how to start a youth group? Share your ideas in the comments below.

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The Youth Retreat Volunteer You Need To Have

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Youth Retreat VolunteerQ: I’m planning a youth retreat and am trying to make a list of roles I need volunteers to fill. Are there any roles people don’t normally consider that I might have missed?

A: There are many different roles that need filling by volunteers on a youth retreat. We’ve outlined many of these in our youth retreat book, but here is one that you may not have considered:

Designated Emergency Contact

We’re not talking about having emergency contact details for parents and guardians, although that is something that should always be included on the registration form.

Instead, we mean having someone who’s a designated emergency contact for the youth retreat for both parents and yourself. This should be an adult who’s available 24 hours a day for the duration of the retreat. They don’t have to be one of your regular volunteers, just someone who’s willing to perform this role.

Phone Numbers

This responsible adult should be given phone numbers for:

  • All the parents
  • Yourself
  • All the other volunteers at the youth retreat
  • The retreat center
  • Any other location you might visit (e.g. theme park, climbing center, high ropes course, etc)

Why You Would Call Them

If you have any emergencies at the youth retreat and need to contact parents, you can call this person who can then communicate with the relevant parents. This means that you only have to explain the situation once and can focus on the emergency on hand, rather than potentially having to call several parents.

Why Parents Would Call Them

If parents have an emergency (e.g. a family member has passed away unexpectedly), they can call the emergency contact who can then call you.

Having someone perform this role ensures that you won’t be interrupted at inopportune times by parents who don’t have an emergency, but who just want to make sure that their little Johnny isn’t feeling homesick. This middleman can therefore make a judgment call to decide if they should contact you immediately.

For situations that aren’t an emergency, you could pre-arrange a time for this volunteer to call you each day – one that fits in with your youth retreat schedule, such as during free time or at lunch.

Recruiting a designated emergency contact as a stay-at-home volunteer therefore helps ensure you have a safe youth trip by having an effective communication structure, while also ensuring you don’t get interrupted by non-emergency phone calls.

Question: What one youth retreat volunteer do you consider to be essential? Let us know in the comments below.

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How To Set Goals For Your Youth Work

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Set goals youth work
How to set goals for your youth work

It’s coming up to the end of the calendar year, so you may be planning on setting goals for the coming year and beyond.

This week’s Best Of Youth Workin’ It is therefore all about goal setting to help make sure you have all the tools you need to set appropriate goals for your youth work programs.

1. Create SMART targets – You may have heard of the SMART acronym before as it details how to set Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-bound targets. This post gives examples of what this might look like in your youth programs.

2. Create SMARTER targets – Don’t just work SMART, work SMARTER by also Evaluating and Reassessing – check out this post to learn how this can be applied to your youth work.

3. Strategic youth work planning – part 1 – This was the first of three posts all about how to create a basic strategic youth work plan. It looks at long range planning and how you can put in place steps to achieve your vision.

4. Strategic youth work planning – part 2 – This second post has 6 areas to look at when making a strategic plan and has a free plan template for you to download and use.

5. Strategic youth work planning – part 3 – The third and final post has 3 areas to focus on, as well as the second part of the free plan template to download and use.

6. What outcomes are you expecting? – One problem that many people encounter when setting goals is that they don’t monitor and evaluate them properly. Make sure you read this post if you want to avoid that problem.

Question: What tips do you have for other youth workers who need to set goals for their programs? Let us know in the comments below.

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When Is A Good Time To Start A New Youth Program?

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Good time start youth work program
Which season is the best to start a new youth work program?

Q: I’m thinking of starting a new youth work program but I’m not sure when the best time to start it would be. What are your thoughts?

A: Any time you have the plan, resources and volunteers ready is a great time to start, but typically new youth programs are started in one of three times:

1. January (or New Year)

Upside: With the start of the new year approaching for many cultures around the world, January is a fresh start, and can be seen as a great time to start a new program. Youth will have just come off the busy time of Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa and will be ready to tackle a fresh project or program.

Downside: In many countries, January is a time that leads to preparation for end of year exams and course work. This means that you may find attendance drops off quickly in February and March as youth are kept home to study.

2. Summer

Upside: In many countries, youth finish their school year in the summer and have a break between 6 weeks and 3 months long. This can make a longer program that might run during the day perfect for starting in the summer months, particularly for youth in areas where there isn’t a lot of youth work provision during the long days of summer.

Downside: Remember that your attendance may be affected by vacations. Also consider what kind of program you are offering; if it’s very worksheet heavy and runs in a structured way like a school day, you may meet some resistance from youth who feel that they ‘aren’t in school’. (Learned that one the hard way!!)

3. September (or New School Year)

Upside: Starting a new program when school starts is favored by many youth workers, particularly if you plan to run it throughout the entire school year or on any kind of academic schedule.

Downside: Youth can be overwhelmed with an increased workload at the start of a new school year and may not begin to have good participation until October or November, which may then drop off over the holidays.

~

All three options have benefits and possible challenges, particularly with regards to attendance. Another option to consider is to run short, sharp programs for 1-3 weeks at a time in school holidays or during winter and spring breaks.

Question: When do you like to start youth work programs? Let us know in the comments below.

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