NCJ Number
146478
Date Published
1993
Length
36 pages
Annotation
This is the second of three reports on the first year's research of the project entitled "Professional Development for Youth Workers," which intends to develop and implement communitywide training systems for youth workers nationwide.
Abstract
The training will provide a basic set of knowledge and skills to those who work with youth at risk for delinquency. Each of the first 3 years of the project has specific purposes and activities. The first year, upon which this report focuses, will involve information collection and synthesis. Researchers will analyze information from trainers, youth workers, project advisors, and the research literature. This second of three reports on the first year's work presents initial findings from interviews with over 130 youth workers and focus groups composed of an additional 90 youth workers. It builds on the first report, "Towards a Community-Wide System of Delivering Core Training to Youth Workers: Lessons Learned from Training Organizations," and incorporates findings from the Stronger Staff/Stronger Youth project. The interviews were conducted to obtain an overview of the training experiences of youth workers. This needs assessment focused on six broad categories of information: past learning modes, past staff-development experiences, current and future staff-development needs, organizational support for staff development, learning dissemination, and barriers to training. The focus groups were conducted to obtain more specific information on the understanding, awareness, and use of a youth-development perspective in working with youth. Descriptive data in this report will provide a context for the third project report. 23 tables