Journeying together: growing youth work and youth workers in local communities

With the Rank Foundation's Youth or Adult? initiative about to reach 21 years, it is an appropriate time to look back at its achievements and to look forward at how work can be developed more broadly in the field.

We are calling this project Journeying together. The title reflects the fact that the partnership between everyone involved – the Rank Charities, George Williams College and the workers and managers in community organisations – is central.

As part of the project, we have thought very carefully about what Rank is trying to achieve and the rationale behind what we do. A steering group, comprising workers and managers with personal experience of Youth or Adult?, as well as staff from Rank and George Williams College has discussed what we see as the key characteristics of Rank’s approach and these are the themes we are inviting those within the network - and those who have been part of it - to join with us. 

The first major step in beginning is to collect stories and pictures from across the Rank network – both current and past. If you are no longer involved in youth/community work we are still very interested in hearing from you, in order to find out if there are elements of the experience that have stayed with you. Please contact us.

Publishing the findings

We plan to publish the findings of our review in four main ways:

• A short DVD, using words and (probably still) pictures to tell some of the stories that illustrate the Rank approach and its impact. There will be a booklet produced to go with this.

• A booklet that provides a potted history of the initiative; a taste of the youth work involved; reflections on the impact of the training; the impact of the work on others; and a summary of the approach taken by Rank.

• A website that will be a resources for the network, as well as a way of telling others about the work.

• A book that draws out some of the key lessons from the Youth or Adult? experience.

This is our thinking at the moment - but it is likely to change as we go.

Making a start

We’re hoping that you will want to contribute to Journeying together by recording your ‘Rank experience’. More about how you can do this later.