Youth Clubs as Lifelines for Vulnerable Young People

This week the Youth Endowment Fund (YEF) published the final Children, Violence and Vulnerability (CVV) report from 2024. The survey asked more than 10,000 teenagers across England and Wales about their perceptions and experiences of violence, making it the largest of its kind ever completed. It helps us to understand the national picture of how violence is affecting children and young people in real-time. 

Each weekly report zooms-in on a different theme. This includes who experiences violence; social media; boys, girls and relationships; and views on the police.  

The final report focuses on access to youth clubs, positive activities and trusted adults. It is a theme that’s close to my heart. 

My Frontline Journey 

Over a decade before joining YEF as Director of Public Affairs and Communications, I worked with young people in a range of settings, from secondary schools to youth services to prisons. I learned the ropes as a youth worker by designing and delivering educational, inclusion and arts engagement programmes across London and beyond. 

I came up against humbling setbacks, institutional barriers and shocking losses. There is no easy way to prevent something as widespread, intergenerational and human as violence, especially in our distracted and atomised modern world. But I also witnessed the resilience of young life and developed a hopeful belief in our collective ability to solve social problems with the right approach. 

My journey has shown me that youth clubs, positive activities and trusted adults – especially when merged effectively – can and should be at the centre of how we support young people affected by violence and prevent it happening again. 

Youth Clubs: Essential Bricks and Mortar 

The findings from the latest CVV report show that 40% of teenagers attend a youth club at least once a month. But those directly affected by violence are twice as likely to attend: 60% of young victims and 65% of perpetrators of violence attend youth clubs, compared to 31% of those without direct experience. 

While most youth clubs are open to all children, they are especially effective at engaging those who are more vulnerable to violence. This includes teenagers who have been excluded from school, are supported by social services, have special educational needs or report involvement in ‘gangs’. 

My most formative and challenging experiences as a youth worker took place in a youth club in Brixton, south London. As I recount in my book Cut Short (2021), as instances of violence peppered the local area across 2015-2020, affecting multiple teenagers who I’d been working with, I saw firsthand the vital role that secure, accessible bricks-and-mortar spaces can play in keeping local young people safe outside of school hours. 

Boys would head to the youth club if they’d been let out early from their Pupil Referral Unit (PRU), stopped-and-searched by police or attacked by those from rival parts of town. The youth club was a sanctuary. For those living in dense urban areas with high levels of deprivation, where there is little room to relax in public space without fearing authority or danger, these services can be a home-away-from-home; a place to unlearn hypervigilance, drop guards and receive advice, support and mentorship from wise, relatable elders. 

Research has shown that drastic cuts to youth services across the 2010s, leading to the closure of 30% of youth clubs in London alone, may have had a significant negative impact on educational outcomes and crime. Through CVV, we now have clear data showing that these services are relied-upon by the most vulnerable young people across the country. This should be taken seriously by the new Labour government in their plans for Youth Futures Hubs, a new National Youth Strategy and the adventurous aim of halving knife crime in a decade. 

Positive Activities: Catharsis, Escapism and Mattering 

By reaching children directly affected by violence, youth clubs can create important opportunities to connect them with positive activities and support that could help protect them from harm. Activities commonly offered by youth clubs may be particularly effective in preventing violence.  

For example, sports programmes have demonstrated positive impacts, such as reducing aggression, improving mental health and supporting better behaviour. Mentoring has also been found to reduce instances of violence and behavioural issues.  

While youth clubs provide access to other positive activities — such as art programmes, adventure and wilderness activities and detached youth work — research on these activities is limited and their effects on reducing violence are less well understood. 

But I can anecdotally vouch for them. Many of the mentoring and arts engagement programmes that I have delivered involved leveraging literacy and music to build rapport and create a safe space for sensitive conversation with young people affected by violence. This ranged from lyric-writing workshops to studio sessions to debates about the complexities of contemporary music culture. Whilst often demonised and blamed for social ills, rap and drill music can act as a source of catharsis to purge trauma and negative emotions. 

Positive activities teach young people skills that could pave a path towards greater self-worth and financial stability. But they also create time, space and empathy for those dealing with stressful lives to escape normality and simply feel like they matter. 

Trusted Adults: Life-Changing Conversations 

The CVV data found that nearly 1 in 5 young people (18%) lack a trusted adult in their lives. Among those who do have a trusted adult, 58% identified one at school.  

However, for the most vulnerable teenage children, support often comes from outside the school gates. Only 37% of recently excluded teens trust a teacher, compared to 62% of those never excluded. Excluded young people are twice as likely to trust a sports coach (35% vs. 17%) and nearly three times as likely to trust a youth worker (15% vs. 5%).  

Similar patterns appear for young people supported by social services, those who’ve carried a weapon and those who report gang involvement. These findings highlight the need for accessible programmes and activities that connect vulnerable children with trusted adult support. 

My youth work career began when I was matched as a volunteer mentor to a 12-year-old boy. We had been holding fortnightly one-to-one sessions for three years when my mentee’s older brother was murdered. Because of our established dialogue, I was able to hold space for him to be vulnerable, express how he felt and talk through how to respond. 

Having access to trusted adults outside of school and home to talk to can be essential for any young person’s navigation of adolescence, risk and relationships in areas with high levels of violence. 

If the new CVV data tells us anything, especially in the context of a new government seeking fresh ideas to make a difference on the ground, it is that youth clubs, positive activities and trusted adults should be seen as vital tools to use in collaboration for keeping the most vulnerable young people safe.  

The time to reinvest in and research to understand them is now.