Youth Work and Me

Youth work changes lives, yet in recent years we have seen youth work budgets being cut across the country.

In 2019, we published our first Youth Work and Me report, outlining young people’s experiences of youth work in Scotland. This report highlighted how youth work has changed young people’s lives, and the impact youth work budget cuts were having on young people in Scotland.

Since our first Youth Work and Me report was published, the lives of young people have dramatically changed. The past four years have seen a global pandemic, major disruptions to our education system, increasing concerns about the climate emergency, a growing mental health epidemic, a cost-of-living crisis, and many other changes in our day to day lives. Throughout this time, youth work across Scotland has continued to deliver essential support to thousands of young people, despite increasing funding challenges.

To find out how these changes have impacted young people’s lived, we carried out a new Youth Work and Me consultation, with 86 MSYPs who attended our 79th National Sitting in Orkney in July 2023. The findings from this consultation, published on International Youth Day, show the continuing importance of youth work for Scotland’s young people.

As a rights-based organisation, SYP continues to call on all decision-makers to ensure young people’s views and experiences are considered when developing future budgets, allocating resources, and carrying out planning.