We have spoken a number of times about the duty of care that youth workers hold to report abuse. In Victoria, youth workers are currently not mandated by legislation to report abuse. However this looks like it will change very soon. In a move to enact recommendations of the Victorian enquiry into child sexual abuse two pieces of legislation are set to be tabled. These pieces of legislation will require all adults to report abuse under threat of jail time if they do not.
We at Ultimate Youth Worker applaud the Victorian government for this move and hope that it comes with the substantial resources required to follow up on the reports to come.
Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
We know that a significant number of our readers are youth ministers who are seeking to develop a deeper understanding of young people and youth work. We commend this endeavour. One of the slurs thrown at youth ministry is that it is little more than games and coffees… We disagree wholeheartedly. Youth work in a church context has become more and more complex over the years. More youth ministry professionals have sought to bring the training of youth ministers in line with their secular counterparts injecting developmental and psychological understanding into the theological context.
Over the last couple of years we have had the opportunity to support a number of youth ministries to develop their youth work capacity. Particularly, we have been involved with a movement of the Church towards relational based work with young people. Our work has been to provide a sounding board for ideas and a check and balance process when implementing them. We have also had the privilege of training a number of chaplains in supporting young people, mandatory reporting, suicide intervention and emergency management. These chaplains now have more training than the teachers and principals they work with in adolescent welfare. Over all we have seen a marked increase in training and professional development for those in youth ministry roles towards a more traditional youth work focus.
One group we have been keeping a keen eye on is the team at Youth Vision Victoria &Tasmania. YV, as they are fondly known, have spent a lot of their time developing youth ministers within the Churches of Christ denomination. YV run training and internships, regular professional development breakfasts as well as a number of programs for young people. One other thing that is put out is their quarterly journal ‘Youth Vision Quarterly’.
YVQ February 2014
In the latest edition two articles in particular stood out to me. The first by Mark Conner looks at self care for youth ministers. It could have come straight out of one of our posts on self care with the model used looking very familiar. I was glad to see self care being championed as this is an area that we are really passionate about. The second article by Keith Farmer looks at some of the transitions happening in ministry in Australia. One area that Keith illuminated was that of deeper relational focus in the work. This is also a huge area for youth workers to grapple with.
If you are a youth minister or an interested youth worker I highly recommend the work of the YV crew. Check out there website at http://vic.youthvision.org.au
Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
Over the years more people than I can count have told me that my personality and behavioural styles can irk others and cause trouble. For those who know me well it comes as no surprise that on the Myers Briggs I come out as an ESTJ. Put another way I am a high D and a high I in the DISC behavioural style. I can be forceful, single minded and I do not suffer fools. I can also be the life of the party, an over communicator and start projects with gusto. I struggle to finish tasks, I live life in the clouds and absolutely hate to be down in the weeds with the detail. You see I know myself really well. I have spent a lifetime dealing with my demons and looking right into the good, bad and ugly of my innermost being. I am not afraid to face myself in all my glory and point at the flaws… and the positives.
However, over the years I have met more people than I can count who do not know themselves and struggle with people who know themselves. These people struggle to understand why you will stand your ground when they see a way to cut corners. They struggle to see why you insist on going the extra mile when they want a quick fix. Most of all they struggle when people point out that they are not up to scratch.
When I begin my lectures with new youth work students I ask them for 100%. I tell them they must know themselves and know their content to the highest standard. I tell them that if they do not want to do this they can leave my sector now. I do not want people who play a half assed game doing a number on the vulnerable young people I care about. As you could imagine this gets under the skin of a number of my students.
I believe that youth work is an amazing profession. I believe that most of our colleagues are there for the best and to be the best. I believe we make a difference. But all of this is due to a focus on becoming better than we are right now and a clear understanding that only the best will do. These are the youth workers I want in my sector. These are the youth workers I expect in the sector. If you don’t meet the standard (and your not trying to become better) I will tell you… and I expect that if I was missing the mark you would tell me.
Don’t be precious about where you are at. Remember no one person is the Ultimate Youth Worker it is a journey. We all have more to learn and more to become. When someone says that something won’t work and that the way you are doing it ain’t up to scratch cop it on the chin and fix it. Personalities and behaviour types should be the last thing that comes into the equation not the first. In the end get used to people saying you are a trouble maker. Standing up for your principles makes people who are not there yet uneasy.
Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
I have been in a number of agencies throughout my youth services career and only one of them had a written down budget for youth work professional development. In this organisation I had one of the largest budgets for professional development I had ever had… $1000. However in most organisations I worked in a professional development budget was at best ad hoc and at worse non-existent.
I have heard of a number of ways to divide up a professional development budget and to tell you the truth I have not put much credence in most of them. How long you have been in the organisation? Your role requirements? Your agencies needs? None of them make any sense when you are talking about longevity in the field. When you want to develop workers to sustain your organisation and the sector you have to think outside the box, and for most organisations that means spending money.
In the mining industry here in Australia some of the best mines realised that they were losing workers because they had no reason to stay. The money was good, The work wasn’t to hard but still they were losing staff… Until they started putting money in the right place. They set up great internet, provided training opportunities and expected staff to develop themselves through courses. Everything from first aid to business development. It was open to the newest of staff and the long tremors. From the lowest paid to the highest paid. The expectation was that you did something.
At Ultimate Youth Worker we would love to offer an unlimited budget for professional development but like every youth organisation we have to balance our budget too. In our case we devote 3% of our yearly budget for staffing to professional development. If you earn $50,000 you have a professional development budget of $1,500. We ask our staff to develop a professional development plan that has some things for us as an organisation and some areas that they want to work on. If they want to work on something that is outside the purview of the work we do we ask them to demonstrate how it would support the work we do in the future. If it would support us or the sectors development we are happy to provide the finances within the 3%. We also offer employees further development above the 3% as needed however as a minimum that 3% is always in our budget.
What does your organisation do? Perhaps you can start providing a guarantee for your employees!
Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
Our guest post is being published on drownthenoise.com today – it’s an open look at the idea of vocation in youth work. Feel free to post in the comments about how witty, insightful and amazing it is!!!
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Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
If I hear another person talk about the science behind youth work or the best-practice “research” that has been done I will scream. This pervasive discourse of youth work through a scientific lens, to the detriment of practice wisdom and individuality, will lead to the destruction of our sectors most central ideologies.
Putting people in comfortable boxes has never been central to the work of a youth worker, until recently. To have clear diagnoses, a cookie cutter support plan and a “best-practice” set of interventions is the way of the medical, psychological and scientific sectors. There has been a lot written about the divide between the art and science of youth work with much more over the past decade focusing on the scientific. This does not take into account the the complexities that coalface youth workers deal with on a daily basis. “Becoming a professional when one’s discipline is people/young people requires more than technical knowledge; it requires a way of being that is relational, emergent, flexible, dialogic, participatory, and contextualised“ (Fusco 2013).
Youth work is a flexible, fluid profession. We have historically steered clear of generalising how we work with individuals as it limits our fluidity. We seek to support young people in their context with their individual needs. When we begin to use the frameworks of economic rationalism and the sciences to frame our practice we begin to see people view our practice wisdom and philosophy as weak hokum. Where science seeks fact and answers to problems, we seek to delve into the human condition through questions and journeying with our young people.
There is no doubt that the scientific has bolstered youth work. What we know of brain and psychosocial development has become integrated into our practice kitbag. But, there is a big difference between using the knowledge of a profession and subscribing to its framework and philosophy. If we allow governmental managerialism and our own inadequacies to force us to give up what makes us unique we will regret it.
Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
Over the last couple of days I have been re-listening to some of my favourite podcasts from c2ypodcast. Two in particular grabbed my attention as the guests spoke about the failure of the professionalisation movement in light of youth work core principles. We have stated a number of times on this blog that the professionalisation debate is lacking and unhelpful at best. We believe that qualifications and metrics don’t make a professional… it takes passion, calling and a whole lot of work. First up was Professor Dana Fusco who in discussing her amazing work “Advancing Youth Work: Current Trends, Critical Questions” spoke of the threat that certification of youth workers holds for youth work. The research for other professions appears to show that certification and professionalisation of other professions has not led to the recognition which we as youth workers are seeking. Dana’s discussion led me to think that the striving to become more professional in the human services sector has led to a watering down of youth work principles and practice wisdom.
The second conversation was with an elder statesman in the field of youth work, Dr. Gerry Fewster. Gerry spoke of how insidious and easy it is for us to fall into the trap of practicing just like other human services professions such as psychology or social work in a world which waters down our practice as youth workers. That our uniqueness and ability to work with young people in a fluid way is compromised by blindly following into the mire of professionalisation.
Neither of these professionals believe that youth workers should be less than highly professional. What they do argue is that by limiting the scope and practice of youth workers through managerialism and metrics whilst seeking to gain a better reputation is ludicrous.
Lets be more professional every day, but let us never give up that which makes us unique.
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Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
I was watching an Australian political review program this evening and as I was watching I realised something much more profoundly than I ever had before. When people actively try to hide their business from others we don’t trust them. When governments say they have policy initiative but then do not show them, we don’t trust them. When military say that they are doing things by the book then don’t show their video of their work, we don’t trust them. When corporations use their considerable funds to silence critics, we don’t trust them.
In youth work I have heard a number of my colleagues over the years say that they could not speak about the type of work they do because of confidentiality issues. Let me just say BOLLOCKS!!! I have heard of organisations who actively seek to limit their public accountability. Currently there are a number of inquiries in Australia into lack of transparency of organisations and in a number of these organisations youth workers have key roles.
To save the reputation of our profession and it workers we need more transparency. In our individual work and in our organisations we must come to the understanding that if we want to have complete respect of our work people need to understand what we do.
Be transparent in all you do. It will get on peoples goat… But it will help you to have a successful career.
Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
Late last year Australian youth work was dealt a blow which hurt us to the core. Youth Studies Australia, our journal of 18 years, lost its funding and even after outcry from the sector and pledges to step in it closed up shop. As an avid reader for almost a decade I will miss the journal. The stories and articles as well as the reviews helped me in numerous ways though out my career. Youth Studies Australia is but one journal however that targets youth workers.
A cursory check of my old RMIT library account shows over 20 academic journals devoted to youth work from throughout the world. These journals cover the breadth and width of youth service provision and give youth workers varied policy and cultural backgrounds to draw from. Over the years I have read articles from all of these journals and have found them to provide great insight into young people and youth programs that youth workers can use to develop their own practice.
Previously on this blog we have implored youth workers to read a book, to develop their their knowledge and practice wisdom. We Have asked youth workers to seek professional development opportunities and to study harder. We have asked youth workers to be more accountable to the young people and the sector. One of the easiest and least time consuming ways we know of doing this is reading journal articles.
Journal articles are bite sized peer reviewed gold nuggets of practice wisdom which take less than half an hour to consume and which give years of excellent ideas. Articles are the way Ultimate Youth Workers share what is working for them and their young people for us to leverage in our own practice environment. It is also the most up to date research available to the sector.
In a nutshell, read up.
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Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
The argument levelled at youth work as a profession and youth workers in particular that gets my goat the most is that we are untrained, unqualified yahoos who do more harm than good to the young people we work with. I have spent my career fighting this argument. Against social workers with four year degrees and psychologists with masters degrees a two year diploma at best seems trivial to other social services professions.
That being said we believe there are a lot of people passing youth work qualifications who should not have made it through. Over the summer we spoke with a number of youth work lecturers and teachers from Australia and across the world. In many of these discussions they lamented the calibre of students which were leaving their courses. Students who were doing the course as a stepping stone to something else. Students who were doing it to keep their welfare cheque coming in. Students who were not putting in effort in academic areas or in field placements.
I have heard of a number of students who have been passed in their courses so that institutions can get the money available for graduating students. I have heard of lecturers and teachers passing students just to get them out of their classes. This type of behaviour needs to stop.
If we as a profession are to gain credibility in the community sector it must start in qualifying only those who meet our stringent standards. Minimum qualifications and coasting through need to be wiped out.
Leave us a comment below or post a comment on Facebook and twitter.
Aaron Garth is a Melbourne-based youth worker, social worker, and mental health practitioner with over two decades of experience supporting young people across Australia. As Executive Director of Ultimate Youth Worker, he leads a team dedicated to training, coaching, and developing professionals in the youth sector.
A graduate of RMIT University and current PhD candidate, Aaron has worked across some of the most challenging areas of youth services — from homelessness and mental health to drug and alcohol outreach and residential care. He is a sought-after speaker, educator, and advocate for a more professionalised youth workforce, and has taught at institutions including RMIT, Chisholm Institute, and Eastern College Australia.
Aaron's work is driven by a simple belief: when youth workers are better supported, young people get better outcomes.
First up was