Youth work is not about creating activities on the basis of what the adult world think that young people need, top down. Youth work must always get its energy from a bottom-up approach. The key words are “as perceived by themselves”. This does not prevent youth workers from discussing with young people what they think they might need or be interested in. On the contrary, this dialogue is crucial to youth work, supporting young people in seeing themselves, their needs as well as their possibilities.
This core principle also relates to the often-heard remark that youth work needs to be “fun”. “Fun”, however, is often confused with “amusing” or “entertaining”. A voluntary activity must of course be attractive if young people should want to take part, but the activities and values that young people search for during their free time cover a much wider range than just mere fun. Finding room for exchanging ideas and opinions on personal as well as societal issues, getting new experiences or developing new skills and interests are just as often on the agenda. Not forgetting that it is often perceived as “fun” to take part in very serious discussions and to perceive that you are developing as a person and social being.
Sometimes youth work tends to focus more on interests than on experiences, which in turn often turns its focus towards traditional leisure time activities. Experiences, on the other hand, might be related also to, for example, sexual harassments in school, racism or a strongly felt anxiety for the climate crisis. These kinds of issues are often even more important to young people and might awake their will to participate even more than traditional leisure time activities. If youth work wants to be credible in the eyes of young people, it must actively open up also for activities related to these kinds of experiences.
