As I was driving to meet young people in Southend the other day, I was pondering the success of accreditation schemes in youth work. I know that accreditation is one of the key Resourcing Excellent Youth Services targets for youth services, and I would never dispute that achievements should be properly recognised. My only question is: do young people actually value the plethora of awards suddenly available to them through youth clubs?
Do opportunities such as AQAs, OCNs and Duke of Edinburgh's Awards really mean anything? Or are they just pieces of paper to be shoved in a drawer and forgotten? My hope is that the incentive of gaining a highly respected award inspires young people and creates achievement opportunities outside of formal education. Certainly, this fits with the Every Child Matters outcome to "Enjoy and Achieve". But might it be the case that for some, accreditation has had the reverse effect? Could they have been deterred from even coming through the youth club door in case a well-meaning youth worker tries to make them "work towards something?
And what about detached projects? Young people on the streets have already made their feelings about formal youth facilities pretty clear by choosing not to go. How do they feel about being "targeted" with the chance to take part in an accredited piece of work? Detached youth work is a powerful way to engage them, but surely if young people wanted badges they would have joined the Scouts, which has been running a highly successful and well respected accreditation scheme for the past 100 years.
I made a point of asking the young people I met that day what they thought: to accredit or not to accredit? Their opinion, albeit for different reasons, was unanimous: accreditation is worth-while. One young man commented that gaining an award made him "feel good" about himself. Another suggested that the staff support he received had enabled him to achieve more than he thought possible.
Young women in the group were very vocal about the advantages of The Duke of Edinburgh's Award. "Everyone knows what it is," one declared. Another added to this: "It will look good on my CV for university." A quiet young man had the last word on the subject: "It's different to what you do in school. You choose to do this and it's good fun."
Vanessa Rogers is a youth work trainer, consultant and author, Vanessa.rogers@haymarket.com.
