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Who are we?

The Participation Service is made up of a team of professionally qualified youth workers and youth support workers.

The team aims to facilitate children and young people having their say in a number of ways. For example:

  • Influencing health, education and police provision within the City
  • Interviewing candidates for jobs, where people work with children, young people and families
  • Helping to create documents that young people can understand and relate to
  • Supporting the work of the local safeguarding board
  • Recognising the achievements of children who are in the care of the local authority and supporting them to have a say in the way the Council runs their services
  • Youth democracy
  • And so much more!

Our Vision

The vision of the participation service is to put children and young people at the heart of practice by engaging them within a framework of participation, consultation and involvement which enables their views, voices and experiences to shape and improve service delivery.

By doing this we also aim to support their personal development and understanding of their own personal journeys.

Our Aspirations

To enable us to deliver our vision we will aspire to:

  • Put participation of children and young people at the heart of achieving positive change.
  • Engage with a range of children and young people to hear their views, with a particular effort being made to enable participation of children and young people with fewer opportunities, including those who are vulnerable or affected by discrimination.
  • Create safe spaces and opportunities for children and young people to be heard.
  • Facilitate feedback to decision makers and those involved in service delivery and decision making affecting young people.
  • To support young people to develop skills and knowledge so they can be fully involved in shaping services through recruitment, selection and training.
  • To advocate for young people who want to pass feedback to services and work with the complaints team to enable their voices to be heard.
  • To participate in national initiatives to enable a wider platform for Plymouth children and young people to be heard and to learn from others.
  • To provide children and young people and service providers with access to highly skilled, dedicated and passionate Youth Workers.
  • To raise children and young people’s confidence, aspirations and achievements through engaging with our services.