The arts can be a valuable tool for reconnecting young people with mainstream education and training. Nikki Crane outlines how Arts Council England and the Youth Justice Board are working together to explore the role of the arts in preventing youth offending.
In 1999 Arts Council England (ACE) produced a framework document about the arts and social exclusion. Work in the criminal justice system was a key theme of this paper and hence a strategic partnership has been set up with the Youth Justice Board (YJB). This is rapidly generating activities to re-engage young people in education and training for those in the custodial system and those at risk of entering it. Establishing sustainable partnerships is a complex process but one that both organisations share a commitment to achieving.
Evidence and research
The extent to which the arts can keep those young people at risk of offending out of crime is difficult to prove and quantify. Anecdotal evidence to justify its validity is in plentiful supply but the partnership between ACE and YJB agreed early on that a rigorous evidence base was needed. In order to achieve this the partnership needed to establish sound methodologies and more effectively engage the expertise of artists and criminal justice staff alongside academics to further the research aims.
It is essential that the importance of the arts in dealing with issues of social exclusion is not overstated as this would be counter-productive; but it has become increasingly clear that the arts can act as a catalyst for the re-engagement of young people in learning and thus into employment in the long term.
Joint research programmes have been set up with ECOTEC (a social affairs research consultancy) and with Nottingham Trent University. ACE is also working with the Research into Arts & Criminal Justice Think Tank (REACTT). This is a group involving representatives from several key organisations, such as the Home Office, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, academics and the Unit for Arts and Offenders, which has been the main facilitator.
Notably, research has been undertaken into Splash Extra, a programme of diversionary summer activities run during the 2002 holidays as part of the government?s street crime initiative. The initiative aimed to provide a high quality arts experience for young people aged 9 to 17 who were at risk of committing crime. 125 arts organisations took part in almost 300 schemes across the country, engaging over 13,000 young people. This research has begun to provide powerful evidence to support long-held anecdotal assumptions.
Key findings
Arts practitioners are able to:
? address key social problems that affect young people at risk of offending
? change group dynamics rooted in aggression and conflict into a more supportive atmosphere
? motivate young people
? allow participants to explore personal issues through arts-based activities
? give young people a sense of pride and achievement in demonstrating newly acquired skills.
Learning the lessons
Splash was primarily about diversionary activities but it indicated the clear potential for increasing learning opportunities. Despite tight timetables, it proved to be a launching pad for other activities, helping the partnership to attract serious consideration from government departments and national bodies. Splash has been succeeded by Positive Activities for Young People (PAYP), which ran this summer and is now available in all school holidays.
Splash also raised the need for more professional development programmes for artists. Although many arts practitioners have experience of working with adults in prisons, relatively few have the same experience with younger age groups. The partnership is working to establish national professional development opportunities which will be linked into the YJB?s national qualifications framework. ACE is looking into the training needs and resources which will benefit both arts practitioners already working, or wishing to work, in this field, as well as youth justice staff.
Literacy and numeracy
The YJB has launched the PLUS programme, an initiative which focuses on improving literacy and numeracy. Together with ACE, the YJB is developing arts enrichment programmes as part of this. PLUS will have a significant evaluation strand, which will extend over three years and assess the gains made in literacy and numeracy and the impact of this on offending behaviour.
Profile building
There is an ongoing need to raise the profile of the impact of the arts on the youth justice system. The partnership has given this huge impetus and in time, ACE and YJB hope to create joint websites and directories to provide accessible information with contacts and effective practice models.
Progress is being made steadily but the emphasis remains on depth rather than breadth. As a consequence of the partnership between ACE and YJB and the commitment and energy of staff across the country, as well as that of the key arts agencies and organisations, the floodgates are now firmly open. However, pressure is already beginning to mount since resources, both financial and human, have been vastly underestimated in meeting the demand. What is clear is that in the long and complex process of tackling the issues that confront young people in the criminal justice system, the arts do have the potential to have a dramatic effect.
Nikki Crane is Head of Inclusion at Arts Council England. t: 020 7973 6781;
e: nikki.crane@artscouncil.org.uk