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  • The Pathway to Participation

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    scissors
    January 23rd, 2008masParticipation & Citizenship

    pathway-to-participation.pngIn ‘A Practical Approach to Youth Participation’ I included a chapter called the ‘Pathway to Participation’. I’ve adapted it and attached a pdf here. I started thinking about this again after seeing an appeal for young people to sit on an ‘advisory group’, and this got me thinking about the difference between a developmental approach to involving young people progressively and just recruiting young people ’straight to the top’.

    Next month we’re doing some work with Streetgames. They’re exploring how to support young people from taking part in sporting activities with them through to becoming involved at a strategic level with the organisation. When we originally met up to discuss this, we spoke about the pathway and the need to have it in place prior to our training with them. The ‘pathway’ is the ‘journey’ that young people are able to take through the organisation – its how young people are able to progress from their initial involvement and then on to whatever positions of responsibility/involvement the organisation can offer them.

    To use a sports organisation as an example this might be something like:

    • Taking part in sports activities
    • Helping run sports activities
    • Organising sports activities for the community
    • Representing young members/advisory role
    • Full member of the committee

    This is a very simple example, but it illustrates how a young person could progress through that organisation if they wanted to. A feature of the pathway is that not all young people will want to go all the way down the path! So it allows for them to decide how far they’d like to go. There are other benefits too but you can read about them in the pdf.

    Unquestionably this is a long term approach – it’s much quicker to just recruit young people straight to the top. But in my opinion the pathway approach will prove far more beneficial. Young people that travel along the path are much more likely to be genuinely interested, loyal, skilled, competent and understanding of the issues related to the work of that organisation. It does however require more consideration, time and resources – but then you could consider those things an investment!

    Pathway to Participation

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  • This is a really useful summary...

    And it can help in unpacking the 'participation in what...?' question.

    'Participation in activity' -> 'Participation in running an activity' -> 'Participation in directing activities' -> 'Participation in running an organisation'.

    It would be interesting to explore how this can map onto ideas of developmental pathways...
  • mas
    yes and I forgot to mention in the main article that I think a further benefit to presenting a 'pathway' is that by subsequently allowing young people to progress along it there is a far greater chance that in time they will shape the pathway themselves - therefore supporting the personal development of young people and also developing the ways in which young people are able to participate.
  • Great start! Its excellent to see other folks working on expanding Hart's Ladder - while that's a useful tool, its not the "be all/end all" for planning. One of the ways that I prompt that expansion is by working with activity planners to expand their visions for who, where and why youth participate - not simply *how*. Using your example to demonstrate, here's how I would push thinking with someone who told me this is how they'd like youth to progress through their activity:

    * Taking part in sports activities
    - Which activities?
    - Who decides those?
    - Why are those choosen?
    - What outcomes are expected from the participation of youth in those activities?
    - Who decides what those outcomes are?

    * Helping run sports activities
    - What does "helping" mean?
    - What options are there to "helping"?
    - Who decides what "helping" means?
    - What is the goal of involving youth in "running" these activities?
    - Who decides that goal?

    * Organising sports activities for the community
    - What is the role of adults in this?
    - Who decides their role?
    - Why?

    * Representing young members/advisory role
    - What does "representation" mean?
    - What's an "advisory" role?
    - Why not full membership?
    - How is a youth choosen to be a representative?

    * Full member of the committee
    - What is the ratio of youth and adults on the committee?
    - What knowledge do the members of the committee need in order to engage young people as full members?
    - What skills do they need?

    I might suggest that there are several other potential "entry points" for youth participation in the schema you've presented, e.g.:

    - Surveying the community to identify which sporting activities young people want.
    * Taking part in sports activities
    - Assessing current activities to identify where and how youth want to be involved.
    * Helping run sports activities
    * Organising sports activities for the community
    - Planning, developing and facilitating alternative sporting activities
    * Representing young members/advisory role
    * Full member of the committee
    - Splitting the committee 50/50 between youth and adult members with behavorial expectations that ensure equal treament for youth.

    There's a researcher out of the University of Sussex named Michael Fielding who has conducted a great deal of study on student participation in schools. He has an excellent Framework you might find useful that I have posted at http://soundout.org/framework.html

    I look forward to reading more great posts from you!
  • mas
    Thanks Adam - really useful thoughts there & definitely lots of opportunities to delve deeper into the different stages, entry point and exit points too (or places at which peoples involvement/participation plateaus). Will come back to this soon and see if I can expand a bit further on it.
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