At-risk young people build employment skills
Nicole Weinstein
Tuesday, November 28, 2023
Multi-agency partnership helps prepare disadvantaged young people for the world of work through employer-led workshops and interactions with major businesses.
ACTION
HeadStart is a volunteering and employability programme that supports disadvantaged young people to develop the skills, experiences and confidence needed to secure and stay in employment.
Run by national charity Family Action, the programme is for 16- to 18-year-olds who have been identified by their further education college as at risk of becoming not in education, employment or training. The seven-week programme, which is being piloted in London and Manchester, supports young people to “give time, gain skills and get ahead” by taking part in social action volunteering, employer-led workshops and employer interactions with brands and businesses such as Nando’s, Brands2Life and Bloomberg.
“It’s a ‘pre-crisis’ preventative service aimed at bridging the gap between education and employment,” explains director of HeadStart Robert Whiteside, who has been with the programme since it was launched by social integration charity The Challenge in 2014.
When Family Action took over the running of HeadStart in 2020, after The Challenge went into administration, it evolved from a “light touch” national employability programme where young people could sign up for volunteering opportunities through the website, to a programme with “low numbers and high support”, Whiteside says.
“Since Covid, we’re seeing real polarisation between the haves and the have-nots, not just with regards to poverty, housing and education but access to meaningful work that isn’t just low paid, entry level,” he adds.
One of the key features of HeadStart is that it involves multi-agency partnership working. “There are four partners – us, the college, the community organisation that the young people volunteer or do a project with, and the businesses that support them,” says Whiteside. “We all work together for the benefit of the 10 or 12 young people on the programme.”
Three weeks of the programme are dedicated to four-hour weekly volunteering sessions or social action in the local community. Students with English as a second language at South Thames College in London, for example, worked with AFC Wimbledon Foundation to develop a marketing strategy to raise awareness of their new fundraising campaign. This involved handing out flyers and talking to the public about the foundation’s aims.
“The majority of the group were asylum seekers or refugees, so the idea of speaking to strangers was a big ask but they reported feeling more confident after going outside their comfort zone,” Whiteside explains.
After reflecting on the life skills they learnt and their relevance to the workplace, the students attended a workshop with communications company Brands2Life, where they covered personal brand, first impressions, personal storytelling, teamwork challenges and interview skills.
Brands2Life, which has supported 180 young people through the HeadStart programme over the past two years, says that the partnership supports its goal to widen participation into the PR industry, boosting diversity and making it a more inclusive place to work.
HeadStart is currently being run at South Thames College in London and Stockport College and Altringham College, both part of the Trafford College Group.
IMPACT
Family Action has taken the methodology and reasoning behind the original national HeadStart programme – such as the volunteering aspect, which is a useful addition to the CV – and put it together in a package of support that is appealing to young people, with a HeadStart facilitator and exposure to different industries and businesses.
“Groups of young people who wouldn’t have signed up for HeadStart in 2019 are now getting a lot out of it,” Whiteside says.
Since 2020, 1,150 young people have taken part in skills and employability activities and 160 corporate volunteers have supported the delivery of these sessions. This includes other activities delivered through HeadStart, such as services for young refugees/asylum seekers and ad-hoc workshops during and post-Covid.
Students have reported increased confidence (87 per cent) and improvements in interview techniques (83 per cent) and cv writing (91 per cent).
Family Action is also involved in the delivery of HeadStart Action, part of the Mayor for London’s New Deal for young people. It hopes to roll out a 10-week version of its core HeadStart programme to Walthamstow College and Barnet and Southgate College in 2024.
