THE NATIONAL YOUTH AGENCY: Comment - Knowles and Wylie - rumoursquashed

If you search the words "misheard lyrics" through Google, you'll find several web sites dedicated to the embarrassing phenomena of misinterpreting the words to popular songs. Often - usually as young people - we mishear a line from a famous song and even when we find out what's really being sung, that first impression stays with us. The most famous example comes from Purple Haze in which Jimi Hendrix asks us to " 'scuse me, while I kiss the sky". Many people thought he was actually offering to "kiss this guy", a concept that raises some unlikely questions about the late star.

I was recently excited to observe that The National Youth Agency had at last ascended to the realm of popular culture when Beyonce's chart-topping hit Crazy In Love actually name-checked Tom Wylie, our chief executive.

"When I talk to my friend Tom Wylie," the star croons at the start of verse two. Then, in sober reflection, I realised that even though our man Wylie can call on contacts ranging from Newsnight's Gavin Esler to David Blunkett, it is unlikely that his address book also includes the former Destiny's Child singer. Blast - I had misheard the lyric and youth work was not, after all, about to become seriously cool.

But in retrospect, perhaps this isn't such a bad thing. If we want to provide young people with the service they deserve, we must speak to them as adults and not try to communicate with them using "the language of the street". However closely we want to work with and involve young people, we must accept that certain things must remain strictly theirs. For example, I am told (not by Tom) that Beyonce can be described as "bootylicious" - but were you or I to use this epithet we would quite rightly be laughed off the premises.

Youth work needs to keep a certain distance. If we want to be taken seriously by young people we must firstly be true to ourselves, showing that we understand their issues without pretending we are part of their "crew".

Otherwise we're just going to keep mishearing.