Raising and Realising Aspirations: A Regional Conference

The Raising and Realising Aspirations Conference took place at Stadium of Light on 30th January 2009, was delivered by a partnership group consisting of Government Office for the North East – Children and Learners Group including the Regional Teenage Pregnancy Coordinator,  the Learning and Skills Council, the University of Sunderland Centre for Children, Young People and Families, and the Regional Youth Work Unit – North East.

The partners came together out of a common interest in, and commitment to, raising and realising the aspirations of children and young people in the North East. The group wants to ensure that all the positive words that have been said on raising the aspirations of children and young people are translated into action.

The partnership group are committed to realising, as well as raising, the aspirations of young people in the North East.

The conference was very successful, over 200 people attended to join in on the discussions on developing and implementing effective policies for children and young people.

Below are the presentations and reports that derived from the conference:

The Role of Key People in Supporting Young People’s Aspirations: Neil Burke and Laura Wright

Supporting Vulnerable Young People

Determinants of Aspirations: John Vorhaus

Inspiring communities

Case Studies: What works

Raising Aspirations Final Report

If you would like more information about this event, you can contact us

Making Participation Work

Wednesday 23rd April 2008

Holiday Inn, Washington
Tyne and Wear, NE37 1LB

Presentations from:
- Children’s Workforce Development Council Participation Fund
- RYWU Mapping exercise

CWDC Participation Fund Projects
- Darlington and Stockton
- Middlesbrough and Recar & Cleveland
- Sunderland
- West Middlesbrough Neighbourhood Trust
- Voices, Children’s Society

Workshops:
- Engaging and gaining buy in from senior manager
- Young people’s involvement within a training setting
- Developing an induction process for all staff
Download  for the full version of the Mapping Exercise – RYWU
Download for the CWDC Participation Fund Evaluation Report – RYWU

Wall Post-its

There is a growing chasm between those delivering participation work and senior managers/decision makers/governance figures…we run the real risk of this becoming unbridgeable
I think it is very important that participation ivolves young people and that managers want to make viable ideas happen
Working with school councils to develop more participative practice within schools
Very interesting to hear all the presentations and imnpressed by the quality – hard to relate to my work!
How did the projects try to involve young people from minority groups? For example black and ethnic minority populations? Disabled young people? Travellers?
How were young people involved in the evaluation of the CWDC funded projects?
If you attended the conference and would like a copy of any of the workshop or key speaker presentations, please contact caroline@rywu.org.uk or call 0191 440 4410. Please note we can only send presentations to those who booked a place at the conference.