How rigorous support slashes Swansea's Neet figures

Project
Keeping in Touch

Funding
Includes £70,000 a year from Swansea Council plus funding from other partners

Purpose
To reduce the number of young people not in education, employment or training (Neet)

Background
Back in 2005, Swansea had one of the highest proportions of Neet young people in Wales, with only Newport and Merthyr Tydfil faring worse out of 22 Welsh local authorities. Of 16-year-old school leavers, 12.5 per cent were identified as not in education, employment or training or “status unknown”. Inspired by the Welsh government’s flagship youth policy Extending Entitlement, Swansea council and Careers Wales West embarked on the Keeping in Touch strategy, which identifies young people who are Neet then supports them back into education, training or a job.

Action
The objective in the early stages was to get a better picture of Swansea’s Neet population. ?Jo-Ann Walsh, Keeping in Touch and Neet strategy manager at Careers Wales West, says: “We’ve done a lot of work to ensure data is accurate and to get information on 16- to 18s,” she says. “We then really interrogated that data so we understand the make-up and characteristics of that group.” A range of interventions were tested, designed to engage young people who were Neet. From 2008 onwards the strategy was embraced by a wider range of partners including South Wales Police, Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Health Board, further and higher education institutions, voluntary sector organisations, and the Welsh government.

Practical steps include better information sharing between organisations such as colleges and Careers Wales West, so those who have dropped out are supported to re-engage as quickly as possible.

Another project involved outreach workers visiting young people at home to raise awareness of their entitlements and offer access support.

Perhaps the toughest ongoing challenge has been working with young people who are not seeking to get into education, training and employment, says Walsh. They may often be known to one or more services such as housing, child and adolescent mental health, youth offending or drug and alcohol teams.

The solution has been to offer tailored support led by the local youth service, which can include one-to-one or group work or activities that inspire the young people.

Early intervention work in schools has also been employed using a mix of education data and staff input to increase the ability to identify those at risk of becoming Neet, and a traffic light system has helped shape the response.

Young people flagged as red can get one-to-one help from a key worker or access activities to help them re-engage or be targeted by intensive programmes.

The next stage is to develop work with older young people, which involves working closely with new partners such as Job Centre Plus. “It’s about continuous improvement,” says Walsh. “We have made a real difference but we still had 79 16-year-olds classed as Neet last year so we can do better.”

Outcome
The number of school leavers who were Neet in Swansea has fallen sharply from 371 or 8.3 per cent in 2005 to 79 or 3.1 per cent in 2011. In 2005, the activities of 4.2 per cent – about 118 – school leavers were unknown, but by 2010 and 2011 the status and destination of all school leavers was recorded.

The partnership has also made inroads into the proportion of 17-year-olds who are Neet, going from 7.6 per cent in 2009, to 7.4 per cent in 2010 and 6.4 per cent in 2011.

The latest figures published by Careers Wales West show Swansea is now the fourth best performing authority in Wales when it comes to its overall Neet figure.

The cost savings are significant. The reduction in Year 11 school leaver Neets between 2004 and 2010 in Swansea is estimated to have saved a total of £34.2bn in money and resources.

This figure is based on calculations that suggest each new 16-year-old out of education, employment or training costs taxpayers £100,000 on average during their lifetime.