Exploring youth engagement in a digital age
I saw this research in CYPNOW - Youth club study highlights link to most deprived areas
They have a subscription policy, so you may or may not be able to read it! First few paragraphs:
A quarter of all local authority-funded youth centres and clubs are located in the 10 per cent most deprived postcodes in England, a CYP Now study has found. Almost half are located in the 30 per cent most deprived areas of the country.
CYP Now analysed the locations of 710 youth clubs and centres from 25 local authorities of varying sizes against the government's Indices of Multiple Deprivation (see table below).
The snapshot, which was taken from 95 council responses obtained under the Freedom of Information (FoI) Act, revealed that while most of the 25 local authorities examined were able to fund some level of youth provision in more affluent districts, the majority of youth clubs were located in less well-off areas.
In Leicester, for example, 54 of its 67 council-funded clubs or centres were located in areas ranked in the top third of deprivation.
There are some questionable figures presented - particular around the mix of "youth club" and "youth centre" it seems - therefore the calculations made might not be comparable
If you work in one of the areas cited, maybe check if the figure for local-authority funded provision is correct. I know from tomorrow in Manchester, that figure will go down to zero...
Comment by Duncan Hodgson on June 29, 2011 at 18:58 Hi Steven
Having had some time to digest this since this morning I'm definitely of the opinion that without the data behind this it is pretty meaningless. For a start it is pretty hard to draw a comparison between local authorities without considering the size of each of them. Comparing Blackpool Borough Council (a small unitary authority with about 20k young people of school age) with a large authority like Lancashire County Council is pretty pointless.
Added to this the points you raised in your email this morning about the quality of the provision. While "authority A" might be providing 50 youth centres which are of a low standard, "authority B" might only be delivering 10 but to a much higher standard.
You could also go further and look at the attendance data. It's all well and good saying that an authority funds 50 youth centres, if very few young people are attending then it isn't value for money.
I'd be interested to see the data behind this before any conclusions are drawn!
Add a Comment
February 5, 2013 at 6pm to July 2, 2013 at 9pm – Old Street
0 Comments 1 LikeCheck out I-Develop
Shane Baker posted a discussion
Dee Paul Gibson posted an event
Kate Reed posted an event
Tony Cisse posted an event
Helen Miller commented on Tim Davies's blog post Youth Workers exploring Youth Work in 21st Century - Virtual Conference
Helen Miller left a comment for Matt Bamford-Bowes© 2013 Created by Katie Bacon.
You need to be a member of Youth Work Online to add comments!
Join Youth Work Online