Service Review

High quality youth work is pivotal to promoting wellbeing, unlocking young people’s talents and creating a sense of belonging.

Through a Service Review the NYA will map your current provision, identify gaps and develop a clear action plan, focused on your specific priorities. Each review culminates in a recommendations report which will provide a step-by-step guide to strengthen your local Youth Offer, ensuring it is truly youth led and fit for the future.

Why review your youth work offer?

If you’re a Council Leader, Head of Service or responsible for safeguarding, delivering early intervention support or working with partners to develop initiatives to reduce crime and exploitation within your Local Authority area, then a Service Review may help you consider how best to integrate youth work into the new initiatives which are on the horizon.

Through a Service Review, tailored to your needs and budget, we can provide you with the tools and expertise to map your existing provision and a clear plan for strengthening your youth work offer, working closely with delivery partners in the voluntary, community and faith sector.

Understanding your local youth work ecosystem and being able to map this against the needs of young people in your area is essential for you to deliver and commission effective youth work and to fulfil your Statutory Duty to deliver a sufficient youth offer.

What does a Service Review involve?

We offer a menu of options for your review depending on the level of support you require and the budget you have available.

Key elements of a review include:

Comprehensive needs assessment: A detailed geographic and demographic analysis of young people’s needs, supported by surveys and focus groups with key stakeholders
Review of existing provision: Mapping and analysis of current youth services, including youth participation and the training needs for young advisors, and multi-agency collaboration with youth workers, including those deployed to allied services
Safeguarding audit: A review of your safeguarding policy and process within the local authority and its grantees / commissioned providers
Case studies and best practice: Insightful examples highlighting effective practice in youth provision and engagement
Gap analysis and recommendations: Identification of service gaps and delivery of a final report with practical, evidence-based recommendations.

A review typically takes between three and nine months to deliver.

After undertaking a service review in 2021, Blackpool Council representative Lisa Arnold, Assistant Director, Youth Service portfolio (until August 2024) said:

“The work that the NYA undertook was of excellent quality and has played a critical part in informing the journey that we are on as a town with regard to youth provision.

“This robust review has resulted in a commitment from all partners to support a collaborative approach to developing youth provision in the long term. The relationships and partnerships with the third sector are now far stronger than at the start of this journey, with a clear vision of what we are trying to achieve collectively, which is having a positive impact on both the development of youth provision across the town but also on other agendas that they now have the opportunity to shape and influence.”

NYA’s team

The NYA team has a wealth of experience in designing and delivering high quality, effective youth work and how to identify and measure quality, best practice and performance.

Many of the team have a background in Local Authority delivery and managing youth services, and particular expertise in: 