Hey pals, how are ya doing?
I'm a bit unwell at the moment,
so I thought I would just do a
little low-key
kind of chatty video about something I get asked fairly often
which is what I do in uni and for work
I go to uni that's my main thing and
that is for youth in community work,
and on top of that I have a part-time job as a youth worker
at the same place that I am doing placement for youth work at uni.
A lot of people think that youth and community work is kind of just like
picking up litter in the streets or just sitting in a room and making sure young people
are not getting in fights and stuff like that when that's not the case.
I thought it would just be interesting to talk a bit about what my job and course kind of, entails.
I guess I'll start with how I got into it.
A few years ago
I started going to a youth group for trans people..
this was like when I was around
18.. I'm 23 now so about five years ago.
I was feeling super isolated and really
internally transphobic so I felt like in order to progress in my transition and
feel a bit better about myself I needed to find other people who are going
through similar things to me.
During that time I was helping out where I could,
I was doing talks in schools about what it's like to be trans and gay,
and just, a young person navigating life.
I also did a few talks at like NHS conferences and
I got used to facilitating groups and sessions around being trans and LGBT
kind of things.
After about three years I kind of found myself feeling really low
and like I didn't know what to do with my life,
so I was asking for support from the people that ran the groups,
and one person knew of a group that might take on volunteers,
I kind of just said yes on a whim and
was like well it's something to do something to kind of maybe help me
figure out what I want to do in life and I started working there just three hours
a week voluntarily.
While I was volunteering that I was offered a place
on a course that kind of introduced you into a youth work and working with young people.
So again I kind of just said yes to that not entirely sure what it meant
and what it would entail but I thought it would be a good opportunity,
something's good to put on my CV and experience and all that kind of stuff.
I started really enjoying what I was learning and realizing that there was a
lot more to youth work than I had originally thought because,
I was one of those people that thought Youth work was just about being in a room,
and having fun, and just kind of being there whilst young people did their thing.
Fast forward to May two years ago maybe? I want to say..
I got offered a part-time job at
that youth project which was great because I was really enjoying it and
it made me feel like I had a purpose.
It was LGBT specific so I felt quite safe,
and I just felt like I was kind of thriving in that environment.
After I did this like course for Youth Work, I was kind of introduced into the idea of
going to university for youth work, and kind of just like encouraged to apply.
At the time I didn't know whether or not uni was right for me I didn't know
if I could do it with my mental health,
I didn't know if I'd be smart enough or anything like that
but I just said yes anyway. I said I'd apply I'd go to the interview to see
what happens and I got in.
While I still had my part-time job at the youth project,
you were given a placement for the first year of university and
the placement I went to was not at all what I really wanted it made me feel really uncomfortable,
I didn't know of any LGBTQ people there so I felt unsafe,
Some of the people that were there were really like difficult to be around,
And the language that was used was really problematic and I just felt really
Out of my comfort zone and I just hated it, and it made me question whether or not
youth work was something that I actually wanted to do.
The kind of things we were
learning about were like the history of youth work and how it developed,
and why it's a thing, and the kind of responsibilities you have as youth worker.
Essentially, in order to get funding for youth projects, a lot of people require you to have set
goals and aims in your project, like helping young people with mental health
and talking about alcohol and drugs and safe sex and all that kind of stuff
so you have to prove that you're doing that and benefiting the young people
in a measurable way,
so they kind of succeed and become a successfully funded group.
So this year I chose where I wanted to do placement and that was in my
workplace which has been really great,
Because the place where I work is really
supportive and it's a really safe environment
A lot of it is like essay
writing there's no exams, but there's a lot of coursework and it's not as simple
as "prove that you're in a room for the people and keeping them safe"
It's about understanding the background of youth work and what the importance of it is,
and how your work affects young people emotionally and physically, and
what would happen to the young people if you weren't there, and why it's important to do
and all that kind of stuff so it's... it's kind of interesting if you're into it.
I have to plan sessions that I know the
young people will be interested in and want to learn about,
things that will
help them,
things that I can evaluate and say that it was necessary because of
these reasons...
so some examples of that would be getting someone from a
Sexual health NHS service to come in with a silicone anatomy and tell young people
about their body parts and how like coils are inside and stuff like that.
We've done things like getting mental health kits, making little booklets so
that they know where to turn and what to do if they're struggling with their mental health.
We've done things like getting counselors to come in and talk
about what counseling is and what mental health difficulties people might go through,
and what they might be dealing with.
Yesterday we did a session on
internalized homophobia which I thought was really interesting,
difficult,
but interesting so I got the young people to think about what scenarios would be
considered as internalized homophobia and why people feel like that and
where it all comes from so that they can understand better about the way they
feel and how to kind of challenge that.
So I have to plan those sessions,
I have to facilitate those sessions, make sure everyone's happy,
make sure that everyone's getting the kind of support
they need.
Sometimes youth work can be quite unpredictable and when you're going
around talking to people,
someone might mention that they feel suicide or
that they're being abused, and you kind of have to be on your toes all the time
to know exactly what to say and who to talk to if they bring stuff like that up,
or what to do with that young person if you don't think that they're going to be
safe when they go home,
and it's kind of really interesting and every day is different,
and I just really love being able to be there.
After these sessions I
have to evaluate everyone and talk about how well every single person did in that
session whether or not they cooperated appropriately, whether or not there are
any issues,
whether or not there is anything in terms of safeguarding that I
needed to report and get in touch with outside services,
like counselors or
police or anything like that,
and then from that evaluation I can
continue my sessions and see what needs to be changed and what needs to be
continued,
and what is most beneficial for the young people.
One thing that really helps me to continue doing it is knowing that I needed this kind of
support when I was younger,
and I think a lot of things that I went through
probably could have been prevented if I had that support,
so I kind of used that
as motivation to bring awareness to different topics and stuff like that.
When I was like first coming out as trans and going through all the medical
stages and talking to therapists and everything,
I really wanted to be a
gender therapist so that I could be a trans person who talks to another trans person,
and at the moment I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to go about
doing that, while I'm studying youth work,
but I feel like over time
might be able to get a degree as a counselor hold youth groups and then at
the side do one-to-one work with people to help them through difficult things,
and then maybe be there for trans people that need other trans people to talk to.
I know it can be really difficult when you're a trans person talking to someone
about your gender who is cis and has no idea what it feels like to not identify
with the gender they were assigned,
so, that's my motivation behind wanting to
be a therapist in a kind of gender therapy setting.
I get quite a few
messages being like "what are you studying at Uni?" and "what do you do for work?"
and so I thought it'd be interesting to kind of just talk about
it more in depth rather than just saying "oh, I do youth and community work" because a
lot of people don't know what that entails,
so there you go that's what it
includes and that's my life at the moment.
I hope everyone's having a great day,
and a great week, and a great month, and a great everything and I will speak
to you soon,
bye.