Youth Workin' It

Consultancy and Resources for Youth Workers and Organizations Worldwide

What Is A Logic Model?

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What Is A Logic Model
That seems more logical than a² + b² = c²

There may be times when you’re asked by your line manager or donors to provide the reasons behind why you’re running the programs that you do. And honestly, even if you aren’t asked for them, it’s always a good idea to know why you do what you do.

Strategic planning can help that. One way you can do some strategic planning is through the creation of a basic logic model.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll create a basic logic model to help you explain why you’re running the youth work programs that you do. I’d like to make this as practical as possible, so please consider sending in your answers to the ‘homework’ listed at the bottom of the post.

What Is A Logic Model?

A logic model is basically a diagram or framework that shows the steps you’ve gone through to identify the needs and solutions to the issues facing your young people and/or community. It also explores what resources you have available and how ready stakeholders are to address problem areas.

The example of a logic model that I’ll be working from is used in a prevention setting by SAMHSA to identify problems, risk and protective factors and possible interventions so that the problems can be addressed.

Here’s an explanation as to what all these terms refer to:

Logic Model Glossary

Resources – What do you have available to help support your youth work? Think of resources beyond just money – consider the people, venues, transportation options and community supporters you have at your disposal.

Readiness – How ready to change are your community, organization and young people? If your needs assessment shows that there’s a problem with sexual health issues in your area but the school and health departments aren’t willing to admit that there’s a problem, your community is probably not at the readiness level to accept an intensive sexual education, contraception and sexual health program and clinic in your area.

Problems and Behaviors – This is where you identify the issues. Are your youth having drug issues or teen pregnancy and sexual health problems? Is there a lot of fighting or bullying in your youth programs or within the wider community between groups of youth? Has there been a spike in teen suicide or depression among the middle schoolers? Does your youth ministry lose students when they reach a certain age?

Problems and behaviors might be identified by you, but they can also (and often best) be identified through a needs assessment. This is a process of finding out what the needs are in the community through various research methods.

Risk Factors – This refers to all the reasons why a young person might be at risk for negative behaviors or problems. Parents that are absent, peer pressure, learning difficulties, relatives that use drugs and low self-esteem can all contribute to a young person being at risk.

Thinking back to the PCS model, risk factors can come from personal reasons, cultural, family and community reasons or reasons from within the wider societal context. Having one or more risk factors in a young person’s life doesn’t automatically mean they’ll have problem behaviors though.

Protective Factors – These are all the reasons why a youth may be protected from negative behaviors or problems. A great support network in the community, having a family with good income, having natural resilience and motivation to succeed and caring teachers make up a short list of possible protective factors. Having one or more protective factors doesn’t guarantee a youth without problem behaviors, but it is more likely.

Interventions – These are the things you do as a youth worker – your programs, mentoring, calls and texts, events and organizations. Interventions are the things you do to help youth achieve their best in the future and avoid problems and negative behaviors.

It could be something small like a drop-in session once a week to talk about safe sex or a weekly mentoring group. Maybe it’s posters you put up at the school or a drug-free dance you host at your church.

Check out the rest of this series on how to create a logic model:

Homework: Between now and next week (please submit answers by Thursday, July 18th at 12pm EST which is GMT -5 hours), think of a list of answers for each of the terms above that apply to your youth work. I don’t expect a full needs assessment to be completed, but you probably have some ideas as to what’s happening in your community and with your youth. Then, contact us through email, Facebook or Twitter (see below) and we’ll use your answers to create logic models in the coming weeks!

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What Is A Youth Group?

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What is a youth group?Q: What is a youth group? Is it any different to a youth club?

A: At its most basic, a youth group is simply a group of youth. This therefore encompasses all kinds of different groups – youth clubs, scouts, LGBT groups, student councils, etc (see our list of different types of youth work for more examples).

Having said that, the term ‘youth group’ is certainly more commonly associated with youth ministry, particularly here in the US.

Purpose

Different types of youth groups have different purposes. For example, as we explained last week, church youth groups generally have the aim of helping young people come to faith and to grow in their faith.

A youth club on the other hand may be provided in a local community to offer activities for young people. This might therefore have no spiritual focus, but instead aim to “keep youth out of trouble” or offer some kind of skills training.

An LGBT youth group may meet to offer support to each other, while a student council might be a group of young people who seek to represent the concerns of fellow students at school.

Ultimately though, most youth groups’ purpose is based on the objective of helping young people progress in some way, whether that’s spiritually, emotionally or physically – or a mixture of all three.

Strategies

Due to the variety of purposes that different youth groups have, a variety of strategies are used to achieve their aims and objectives.

You will often find though that youth groups with different purposes will actually use similar strategies. For example, the Boys & Girls Clubs Of America use the following six strategies:

  1. Education & career programs
  2. Character & leadership programs
  3. Health & life skills
  4. The arts programs
  5. Sports, fitness & recreation
  6. Specialized programs

These strategies are used to further BGCA’s mission, which is “To enable all young people, especially those who need us most, to reach their full potential as productive, caring, responsible citizens.”

You might notice though that these strategies are ones that are commonly used by other types of youth groups, even if they have a different mission statement to BGCA’s. Youth groups can therefore learn important lessons from each other, particularly if they’re willing to team up to form partnerships.

Conclusion

As you can see, the relationship between a youth club and a youth group is similar to that between youth ministry and youth work – a youth club is a youth group, but a youth group isn’t always a youth club. Different youth groups have different purposes and use different strategies, although there’s also often an overlap.

Question: How would you answer the question ‘What is a youth group?’ We’d love to get your input in the comments below.

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What’s The Difference Between Youth Ministry And Youth Work?

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Difference between youth work and youth ministryQ: Some people refer to youth ministry and others refer to youth work. What’s the difference between the two?

A: Youth ministry and youth work are a little like carrots and vegetables. All carrots are vegetables, but not all vegetables are carrots. In the same way, all youth ministry is youth work, but not all youth work is youth ministry.

Youth ministry is done by Christian churches and tends to have a twofold focus:

  1. Helping young people come to faith in Jesus
  2. Helping young Christians grow in their faith

Youth ministry therefore focuses on the spiritual (although we think it’s important to be both holy and holistic). This type of youth work is often headed up by youth pastors and supported by volunteers, but youth ministries are also often led solely by dedicated volunteers – particularly in smaller churches.

Youth work as a whole though covers a much more broad spectrum. Like we mentioned, it includes youth ministry but also includes all kinds of other non-faith based work with young people.

There are too many types of youth work to cover in just one post, so from tomorrow we’ll be starting a new series that’ll be published on Wednesdays. This series will explore all the different types of youth work and will feature interviews with youth workers from around the world who are all experts in their niche. We therefore hope that this will be a great resource for youth workers to discover all the different types of youth work that are out there.

If you’re working with young people in any kind of niche area of youth work, we’d love to do a Q&A with you that we can publish as part of this series. If you’re interested in getting involved with this, please get in touch and let us know what type of youth work you do.

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What Is The Thompson PCS Model?

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Thompson PCS Model
No, PCS – Personal, Cultural and Structural – not PCs!

Q: What is the Thompson PCS Model and why does it matter for me?

A: Please see this excerpt below from some of my MA coursework for an explanation of Thompson’s PCS Model. If you’d like any bibliographical information, please contact us.

“Thompson’s (2006) Personal, Cultural and Structural analysis (‘PCS Model’) does an excellent job of explaining how power relationships are expressed between individuals, groups and through the wider societal context and highlights the layered effect of oppression.

Levels of the Thompson PCS Model (Thompson 2006)

The “Personal or Psychological level” is where individuals form and express personal beliefs and values. This includes “practice, individual workers interacting with individual clients and prejudice.” (Thompson 2006:27) The ideals at this level are based mainly on personal experiences.

The level at which “social norms” are expressed through “consensus” and “conformity” is the “Cultural level.” (Thompson 2006:27) It is at this level where stereotypes are created, etiquette and manners are expressed based on social expectations and other forms of behaviors and belief systems are reinforced. It is at this level where “taken-for-granted assumptions or ‘unwritten rules’” are processed. (Thompson 2006:27)

There is also a societal level which is the “Structural level.” This is where systemic discrimination is created and “institutionalized” through social policy. (Thompson 2006:28) It is also at this level that the media operates and affects the wider conscience of the nation.

The PCS Model shows how each level of society interacts with the other. The power relationships do not exist independent of one another, but are actually interconnected. Personal beliefs when felt collectively create a cultural sense of what is acceptable. Meanwhile, cultural ‘norms’ then affect the personal experiences and thought processes of the next generation being raised within the community. Cultural norms begin to be identified by policy makers and social policy and laws begin to reflect cultural values and beliefs, regardless of their accuracy. As laws change and people become more controlled by the State and its policy makers, it is seen as acceptable to express cultural views, which may discriminate or oppress others. This, in turn, causes individuals to become more oppressed or powerful based on the current governing system and laws.”

The PCS Model is important to understand as it explains how personal beliefs, cultural norms and structural institutions all contribute to oppression within society.

Last week’s post identified what oppression is and how you can work in an anti-oppressive way within your organization. By having a clear understanding of anti-oppressive practice and the PCS Model, you can more fully identify and combat oppressive structures in your organization, community and personal practice – particularly with how it relates to the youth you work with and the ageism they may be experiencing.

Question: How does understanding the relationships between the Personal, Cultural and Structural levels of oppression help you in your youth work practice? We’d love to hear about your experience with the Thompson PCS model in the comments below.

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What Is Anti-Oppressive Practice?

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What is anti-oppressive practiceQ: I’ve heard about something called ‘anti-oppressive practice’ – what exactly is that?

A: Simply put, anti-oppressive practice in youth work is working in a way with young people that actively fights oppression that they may be experiencing through ageism, racism, sexism or other forms of discrimination.

However, it goes beyond simply ‘not discriminating’. It includes action. You, as a practitioner, have to see the forms of discrimination firstly that your youth might be experiencing, and then you have to actually do something to challenge and change the rules, laws and other systems that may be causing the discrimination to be ongoing and a genuine barrier to advancement in the lives of your youth.

Below is an excerpt from the final assignment of the Anti-Oppressive Practice module I took during my MA in Youth Work and Community Development. If you’d like any of the bibliographical information please contact us.

Members of society experience unfair discrimination every day. Sexism, racism, and disabilitism to name just a few. What is the difference between being discriminated against, and being oppressed? Oppression is internalized, making it deeper and more systemic. According to Friere, oppression is the “dehumanization” of people, or at the very least stopping them from fully realizing their full “humanization,” or “vocation” in life. He goes on to say that “[humanization] is thwarted by injustice, exploitation, oppression and the violence of the oppressors.” (1999:25-26) My understanding is that oppression is using the perceived or actual power within a relationship to maintain control over a person, the situation or circumstances. One is actively encouraging the superiority of some to the detriment of others, working to maintain this level of power in the relationship, as the status quo.

“Youth work confronts Socrates’ question, ‘How should one live?’ which is both singular and plural in the sense that it asks, ‘How should I live?’ as well as, ‘How should anyone live?”

Williams 1993 in Young 2006:3

As a youth worker, I agree with Williams. My responsibility is to help young people participate in “moral philosophizing” (Young 2006:3) about the world around them. This is achieved through discussion and dialogue with people. Friere argues that you can’t have good praxis without “the word…within [which] we find… reflection and action.” If one doesn’t express their ideas through action, “the word is changed to idle chatter [or] verbalism”, but if action is committed without reflection “the word is converted to activism…action for action’s sake,” which “makes dialogue impossible.” (1999: 68-69) Therefore, I must be a worker of words, action and reflection to truly help young people achieve their full role in society.

As a reflective practitioner I feel I must ask Socrates’ question “How should one live?” and transform my practice with the answer. This requires recognizing oppression in all its forms, understanding power relationships between people, empowering the powerless, speaking and acting on behalf of the voiceless and challenging system forms of oppression. I must go beyond discrimination – the outward symptoms expressed in society – and challenge the root of oppression on all levels.

Next week, we’ll continue this topic by exploring Thompson’s PCS (Personal, Cultural and Structural) model for analyzing power relationships and helping you recognize possible areas where your youth might be experiencing oppression.

Question: How would you answer the question “What is anti-oppressive practice?” Would you add or take anything away from what’s been written above? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

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