Distilling the essence of Peace4Youth Practice

This report captures best practice within the Peace4Youth programme, with a view to highlighting areas of youth work practice worthy of repeating or refining. This work is a qualitative piece of research to understand core elements of practice and experience in the Peace4Youth programme. We draw out learning gained through conducting practice studies with 30 young people and 24 workers during Phase One of the Peace4Youth programme. The report makes explicit what is often implicit in the practice of workers and gives voice to the experience and insights of participants.

The practice which has been studied here has been grouped thematically to give insight into what the youth workers see and respond to through their human responses, their programming choices and their group work processes. They use phronesis and ecological intelligence to determine thoughtful responses to complex situations. Time and time again, young people interviewed were able to identify the ways in which workers noticed their needs and shifted their approach in accordance with need.