Resources
Links
What is Youth Work?
Models of Youth Work: A Conceptual Overview
What is action research?
The Spiral Model of
Community Education
Rooted in the real interests and struggles of ordinary people; overtly political and
critical of the status quo; and committed to progressive social and political change.
Communicating Youth Work
Chapter 10 in Jeremy Brent's book 'Searching for Community' reproduced in YANQ's Network Noise, pages 22-23, is a great example of how youth work practice can be articulated. We strongly encourage you to obtain and read the whole book.
Healing Centered Engagement
Dr Shawn Ginwright presentation on Healing Centered Engagement -therapeutic vs social/ecological models of trauma
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Hope & Healing
Youth Sector Research
Critical Youth Wok -
Theory and Practic
Queensland trauma-informed framework for foster care and residential care has been developed and delivered by PeakCare. The e-learning training has been developed to capture the in-depth research by specialists in the field. The training is also linked to the Queensland Department of Children, Youth Justice and Multicultural Affairs mandatory requirement of training for approved Foster Carers.
As the peak body for the youth sector in Queensland, YANQ has been undertaking research into various issues which impact on young people and the youth sector. You can access published documents going back to 1991 via the link below.
Jen Kaighin facilitating a discussion exploring the links between critical youth work theories and critical practice. The first part of this webinar was lecture based, i.e. a PowerPoint followed by a discussion about practice, and how to enact critical practice in neoliberal (less than critical) youth work spaces. Jen is currently a lecturer in social work and human services at QUT, prior to joining QUT Jen was a youth work practitioner focused mainly on youth housing and homelessness.
Youth Work &
Community Development
Dr Peter Westoby, a long term CD practitioner, analyst and scholar, facilitated a dialogue on what CD is, and what it might contribute to effective and ethical youth work.
Primary Crime Prevention
Siyavash Doostkhah sharing his experience of managing a primary crime prevention project for 8 years in a low socio-economic community. This project focused on strengthening community and social structures and was highly successful in reducing criminalisation of young people. Siyavash will also draw on his 20-year experience of undertaking research and advocacy in this area.
Community of
Practice
What is a Community of Practice (CoP) and how it operates. A CoP is a group of people who share a common concern, a set of problems, or an interest in a topic, who come together to fulfil both individual and group goals. CoPs facilitate the sharing of best practice and creation of new knowledge to advance a domain of professional practice
Embracing Self_ Determination
In this sessions, Ruby Wharton talks about her approach to working with Murri young people not as help or welfare, but rather as way of supporting the movement for self determination. She also discusses the role of our communities in supporting and nurturing our young people and how to confront racism in our communities which so often is the real reason for the suffering of our young people.
Promoting youth-directed social change
At this session of Youth Work Community of Practice, we examined the influence of youth workers’ critical practice on youth-directed social change among hard-to-reach young people in neoliberal new public management contexts. Young people are increasingly acknowledged as essential change agents in ameliorating their experiences of disadvantage or marginalisation. Yet, youth and community organisations supporting projects and strategies to engage with young people’s agency find change from these interventions is small, or non-sustained.
Our intentions, actions and the challenges
This CoP discussion focused on critical youth work – the intentions, the actions and the challenges. The contexts of youth work practice have changed over time, shaped by neoliberal and managerial discourses and policies. Yet the issues and interests of young people remain the same, to be valued, to be heard, to see a future that they belong in.
Building trusting relationships with
young people
At this session Debbie will be sharing her experience of what it takes to build a trusting relationship with young people, see their power and to move away from a worker/client model to that of co-activist.
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Debbie is one of the very few people who walks side-by-side with young people and advocates for them and with them, a process that has empowered many young people to become involved with social change.
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Building trusting relationships with
young people
Unfortunately, many young people have grown up in environments where they could not trust anyone around them. As youth worker we strive to support young people and at the core of this work is building relationships with young people. At this forum Cate Ryan, a highly experienced youth worker in Queensland, will speak about her practice framework and share some stories about her work with young people.
Young People & Drugs
Young people experimenting with alcohol and other drugs (AOD) is not a recent phenomenon and is often a part of growing up. For some individuals, substance use may be non-problematic or even beneficial, while for others their AOD use might lead to problems.
Karl Lacis's presentation covered concepts in understanding AOD-related harm, ways to respond, where to access useful worker resources and current trends in youth AOD use across Queensland.
Please note: We have included slides of the presentation in the next post.
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Young People & Drugs
''Presentation Slides'
Young People in Distress
Young People in Distress 2
As youth workers, we are often working with young people who have a range of factors affecting their lives and childhood experiences that increase their vulnerability to developing AOD-related problems. So how do we as workers respond to young people who use substances? you can access slides of the presentation by Karl Lacis, an advanced youth AOD educator with Dovetail.
YANQ in partnership with Adelaide University’s Critical and Ethical Mental Health research group have developed an on-line training package with modules containing videos, reflective exercises and templates.
The training resources are designed to help youth workers engage and support young people in distress, and also decide when and how to refer a young person to clinical mental health services such as hospitals and Headspace.
This session was a follow up to the launch of the 'Young People in Distress Online Resources' which was held on 25th February 2025. Majority of the session was held in breakout rooms and as such we do not have recording of these sessions. However, during this presentation in the large group, Jon talked about a couple of issues relevant to working with young people in distress which we believe are important. The video is only three and half minutes long but well worth a watch.