Innovation in Working With Young People in Rural Areas
Ray Fabes, Bob Payne and Jason Wood
These remain challenging times for the rural economy. Those who work with young people in such settings have a vital role to play in tackling isolation in small communities, poor transport, fewer jobs, the rising cost of housing and fuel, and limited social provision. Nor do such issues as discrimination, bullying, homophobia or racism disappear in the countryside.
This publication revisits the National Youth Agency's Nothing Ever Happens Around Here, a seminal work from 1993 that set out the history of rural youth work and captured contemporary practice. That earlier research provided inspiration for many rural youth workers, who saw their approaches to youth work confirmed, and gave them developmental ideas to reflect on and incorporate into their projects.
Assumptions at that time about the slow pace of change in rural areas would have suggested that a considerable period would elapse before it became necessary to again analyse the developments in rural youth work. But remarkable changes have since taken place - not only in the variety of ways to work with young people, but also in the economic and social fabric of the countryside.
This publication charts and considers those changes and discovers growing evidence that the interests of young people in rural areas are now receiving public attention. The book features eight innovative rural youth work projects and discusses the lessons that can be learned from them. It not only supplies inspiration to a new generation of youth workers and policy makers but is also the benchmark against which future change and development can be measured.
Copies are available from the National Youth Agency, price £8.95 plus postage. Visit the online shop at www.nya.org.uk or email sales@nya.org.uk.
