Blog

How can we manage young people’s expectations without crushing their dreams?

This week I attended the youth sector’s annual conference Creative Collisions to hear from, and celebrate, the diversity of young people and the youth sector. Organised by a coalition of 9 leading youth sector organisations…
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New study reviews impact of peer mentoring

An interesting new literature review commissioned by the DfE has been published into the effectiveness of peer mentoring schemes to improve young people's mental health. The study focused mainly on school based schemes but included…
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At What Cost? Estimating the unit cost of service delivery

Why estimate unit costs? One of the concepts considered in making funding decisions is whether a service provides ‘value for money’. But in order to identify this we need to know how much is spent…
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What exactly is ‘perceptual feedback’?

Academics, and those with a special interest in the area of youth participation and user feedback, tend to define new terms for what seem like simple concepts at an alarming rate. One such term is…
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From a funder-centric to user-centric social sector

In a powerful new blog, NPC's Tris Lumley argues that the social sector is incentivised to be accountable to funders, not its users, and that this must change. He sees hope in three important trends…
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