Progression
Dave started his youth work journey as a youth support worker, went on to do his level 3 diploma through the National Youth Agency, and is now just about to start hisMasters in Youth and Community Work.
“I get out of bed every day for this job because it’s so rewarding and just the variety of it. Every day is different and fun. For me I just love my job, everything about it, the team’s amazing, the staff’s amazing. Every day I learn something new too, no matter how long I’ve been in the job. You’re always learning in youth work. Very few jobs out there are as rewarding as being a youth worker.
Just seeing young people with smiles on their faces after you’ve worked through a problem with them. From the big things like helping them to mend a relationship they were struggling with to the smaller things like a young person making a couple of tea for their parents or offering to share something with their sibling.”
Long term rewarding
“Youth Work can be frustrating at times because you don’t see the instant development, sometimes you have to wait a bit later. But then sometimes I’ll bump into people that I worked with two or three years ago and they’re doing amazing, and that’s where I find it really rewarding.
If you want to make a difference, if you want to go home happy and feeling like you’ve made a difference, I would say become a youth worker. There are so many opportunities to do good, you meet so many interesting people.”
Detached
“For me, detached youth work is one of the most important elements of the job. I love speaking to people finding out about them and helping them. You can go out to where young people are, talk to a group of six of them, and each one will have a specific or unique situation, and you can tailor your support to them for each of those situations. It can really open up opportunities for young people who would otherwise never have the chance to have certain experiences.
The development and training opportunities within the job are great too, there are so many specialties and practical training opportunities that are useful outside of the job too.”
