Tko su youth worker-i, što rade i zašto su važni?
Youth worker-i su odgovorni za planiranje, organiziranje i nadgledanje društvenih programa napravljenih u svrhu promicanja jednakosti te pomažu mladima u osobnom, društvenom i emocijonalnom razvoju.
Među ostalim, njihova zaduženja su:
• menadžment projekata
• planiranje i organiziranje prikladnih programa za mlade i zajednicu
• uspostavljanje novih usluga za mlade
• pronalazak, trening i naddgledanje volontera i zaposlenika
• pisanje izvješća i poslovnih planova
• održavanje prezentacija
• reprezentacija interesa mladih
• menadžment i administriranje budžeta i resursa
• priprema i distribucija promidžbenih materijala
• rad s roditeljima, školama, policijom i ostalim organizacijama unutar zajednice
• savjetodavne aktivnosti
Što čini kvalitetnog youth worker-a?
Zajedničko svakom kvalitetnom youth worker-u je to da mogu uspostaviti vezu povjerenja s mladima unutar projekta. Bez povjerenja nema dugoročnog poboljšanja. Ali kada postoji povjerenje tada se mlade lakše otvaraju prema prihvaćanju povratnih informacija ako naprave pogrešku ili prema ohrabrivanju za svoje trenutno i buduće djelovanje. Samo u toj situaciji dolazi do dugoročnog poboljšanja kod mladih.
Sličnost između kvalitetnih youth worker-a može se uvidjeti jer dijele nekolicinu osobina:
• Prisnost: imaju mogućnost pristupiti raznolikoj mladeži, njima nije posao biti prisan s mladima.
• Iskrenost: uvijek govore ono što misle i misle ono što kažu. Mladi mogu osjetiti kada odrasli samo rade svoj posao ili kada iskreno uživaju radeći s njima.
• Ravnoteža: ne unose svoje probleme iz privatnog života u svoj rad
• Skromnost: znaju da nisu savršeni i da nisu uvijek u pravu, imaju želje osobno rasti i pritom traže prilike za profesionali i osobni rast
• Objektivnst: prihvaćaju mlade onakvima kakvi jesu. Imaju sposobnost gledati na svijet iz perspektive mladih, ne projeciraju svoje poglede na svijet mladima i razumiju svoje stavove.
• Stav: uvijek vide potencijal u mladima, shvaćaju da su loše ponašanje i stavovi njihov način obrane od vanjskih utjecaja
Kako bi se znalo je li neka osoba posjeduje neke ili sve od tih vrlina tu je Workpetence. Online alat za poboljšanje kompetencija za zapošljivost mladih. Cilj projekta je povećati kompetencije youth worker-a kako bi kvalitetnije radili s mladima i osigurali im potrebne vještine za razvoj u budućnosti.
Who are youth workers, what do they do and why are they important.
Youth workers are responsible for planning, organising and overseeing community programmes designed to address inequalities and facilitate the personal, social and emotional development of young people.
Responsibilities of the job typically include:
• managing projects
• planning and organising appropriate youth and community programmes
• establishing new youth services
• recruiting, training and supervising volunteers and paid employees
• producing reports and business plans
• giving presentations
• promoting young people’s interests
• managing and administering budgets and resources
• preparing and distributing publicity materials and displays
• liaising and working with parents, schools, the police and other community groups/organisations
• providing advocacy and counselling
What makes a good youth worker?
The commonality among great youth workers is that each is able to create strong trust relationships with the youth in their program. Without trust, there may be a short-term improvement. But when there is trust, young people are willing to drop their defenses. They are open to feedback when making mistakes and encouragement about the future. Only then will long-term improvement occur.
Among the great youth workers who seem to effortlessly create those trust relationships, there are shared traits.
• Rapport: Great youth workers have the ability to engage a wide variety of youth. For them, it is not work to build rapport with young people.
• Sincerity: Great youth workers ‘say what they mean and mean what they say’. Your typical youth has a keen radar. They easily distinguish the difference between adults who do and do not genuinely care about them.
• Balance: Great youth workers have their own life intact. Their own life issues don’t play out in their interactions with youth.
• Humility: Great youth workers understand they are not perfect and don’t have to be right all the time. They have a willingness to learn and grow. They seek out professional and personal growth opportunities.
• Objectivity: Great youth workers accept youth for who they are. They are able to look at youth through the eyes of youth. They do not project their own view of the world onto young people and understand their own biases.
• Attitude: Great youth workers always see youth as potential. They accept the negative behaviours and attitudes as defenses and not character traits. They know that each young person can love and be loved.
To know if you have any or all of those competencies there is Workpetence. It is an Online tool for Competence Balance for Youth Employment. The project objective is to increase youth workers competences on youth employment.
Photo by Mimi Thian