Who We Are

I’m an elected Council Rep for certified members and the current Chair of the IYW. I have around 13 years’ experience of cross-sector youth and community work and specialise in community development with young people, participation and digital youth engagement. I am an Associate Lecturer on the Youth Work BA (hons) course at the University of Brighton.

Worked for Essex CC Youth Service for 15 years in various job roles from P/T youth support worker in training to F/T qualified senior youth worker. Experience includes managing open access youth centres, complementary and Alternative Education programmes, mobile & detached work.

Studied YW Informal & Community Education at YMCA George Williams College, Have a L6 management & Leadership qualification! City & guilds YW Assessor and Internal Verifyer and am a CSE and safeguarding designated lead

Current job role Is Senior Youth and Community Commissioner, leading a team of District and community YW commissioners who work in partnership with a range of organisations to develop new YW opportunities, train volunteers and commission Youth work programmes and initiatives. I am leading on training Young Commissioners & Young Inspectors across Essex, NCS wave leader, I manage 6 youth centres 2 mobile youth buses in South Essex and volunteer at a local voluntary run youth club in Castle Point.

I’m a qualified youth worker and manager with 20 years experience in the field. I’ve worked in both the statutory and voluntary sector and experienced how youth work has changed to respond to Government and community needs. Most recently, this includes the focusing of funding towards Multi-Disciplinary Teams delivering Targeted Work, either with individuals, groups or families reflecting the Troubled Families initiative. Currently working for the Youth Work Unit Yorkshire and Humber, I have a good working knowledge of the Regions Youth Sector, and a variety of approaches being implemented by different areas to developing partnerships and co-production models between Statutory and Voluntary Sectors. I have experience of working in a multi-disciplinary team and the benefits and challenges this brings.

Hi i’m Mike Carroll-Owen, I’m your Website & Communications Lead here at the IYW. I’m an experienced youth and community worker of 12 years with specialist areas in CSE, Sexuality, Sexual Health & Substance Misuse. I’m one of your Elected Council Student Reps.

I am the Chief Executive at Cambridge University Students’ Union, a student-led representative body and charity working to address inequality and disparity in students’ experiences at Cambridge, as well as supporting volunteers and representatives to foster peer-organising as levers for change. A key part of my work both past and present has involved behaviour-change campaigning and policy development at local and national levels.

I recently completed an MSc at Cass Business School and have an ICSA Diploma in Charity Management. As an avid supporter of the voluntary sector as Treasurer of Cambridge’s CVS, and Exec Board member of a national education charity, and am a member of the Institutes of Fundraising, Chartered Secretaries & Administrators, and Public Relations.

Wendy Dawson is Chief Executive of Base 33 Youth Charity. She has worked in Youth and Community and Adult services since 1980 and has a wealth and depth of experience from practitioner to Chief Executive level mainly within the Charity sector. She has personal experience of drug use and homelessness and this is what drove her to work in the health and social care sector.

As a Youth and Community work practitioner in the 80/90s she was a pioneer in detached youth work; developed Newcastle YMCA first non-building based provision in economically deprived area’s supporting the most vulnerable; homeless, sex workers, substance misusers. She wrote the first training manual in detached youth work methodology and delivered training courses across the UK and Ireland.

Politically motivated she has always challenged inequality and discrimination giving a Voice to young people and adults on the margins of society, raising awareness of issues and developing services to support and enable communities and individuals to prosper. She was an active member of The National Association work with girls and young women; raising awareness of the need for single gender provision. She also actively campaigned and developed services to protect from harm men and women involved in sex work

Wendy has worked with Barnardos NE, Newcastle YMCA, Bradford LA, before moving to Oxford to take up a senior post as Director of Services for YWCA GB; she was the first Chief Executive of Connexions North London pilot where she designed and developed the whole infrastructure from scratch; National Director of Youth Advocates intensive supervision and surveillance programme across Brixton, Hackney and Haringey; developer and lead lecturer of Ruskin College, Oxford first Foundation Degree in Youth and Community work and taught on the Social Work Degree and MA Women’s Studies course; Chief Executive the Ley Community a residential drug and alcohol rehab in Oxford. Wendy also has experience of working within services supporting people with leaning and physical disabilities. She is a strategist, financially and politically astute, educated to Master degree level and has informed and influenced social policy over the last 30 years.

Wendy is a Fellow RSA, Co-opted Certified Council Member Institute of Youth Work, On the Governing Executive Ruskin College, Oxford and interested in complimentary therapy she trained to Reiki Master Level in 2000

Andrew is a Youth Participation Officer specialising in youth democracy work with young people. Based in the North East, Andrew has worked in a local authority youth service for over seven years and has also previously worked for detached and voluntary youth projects.

Andrew’s experience of working with young people stretches beyond his experience at work, he also is an adult volunteer in the Army Cadet Force supporting young people in achieving through music.

Andrew studied Youth and Community Work at the University of Sunderland

TBC

Esther Horner-Aird has over 14 years of youth work experience, specialising in youth participation and accreditation and working with looked after young people and young offenders. Esther has worked in front line delivery for many years, progressing through her career into operational management and senior strategic management. Currently Esther is a Director for Kinetic Youth Ltd, a not for profit social enterprise that delivers youth services nationally within the Youth Justice Sector. Esther leads from the front and is a passionate youth worker who pledges to stand up for colleagues and young people in the present difficult time we all face. She looks forward to designing and developing the Institute for Youth Work alongside her fellow colleagues, aiming to help build an organisation that influences national policy and local agendas.

Vanessa Rogers is a qualified youth worker and teacher with an MA in Community Education and experience of managing local authority services for children and young people for over fifteen years before becoming an independent trainer, consultant and author. She is now a recognised expert in youth work, PSHE and social education and is regularly commissioned by statutory and voluntary organisations working with young people aged 11-19 (up to 25 with additional needs) across the UK to provide high quality training and consultancy services.

Coming from an East London/English Gypsy background, Brian entered youth work partly as an escape from the hooligan/gang life of the late 1960s/early 1970s docklands. While working in youth work related situations around the world, including Israel, the Falkland Islands, the USA, Thailand, Hong Kong, Zambia, South Africa, China and Canada, Brian’s interest in identity and ethnicity flourished and today he is an internationally recognised authority on Gypsy Ethnicity, having written widely on that subject, delivering papers most recently in the USA, Greece, Sweden and Slovenia as well as around the UK. Brian has been developing a growing network of practitioners and academics concerned with the exploration of youth work and Islam. Brian gained a BSc at City University, an MA at the University of Essex and was awarded his doctorate by the University of Kent. Brian is visiting lecturer for the University of Malta.

I have been active in youth work for many years. I have achieved a level 4 certificate in youth work and theology with Oasis College, and working towards the BA degree.

I have experience with local council youth matters, have received recognition from Wandsworth Council Mayor (2012) for voluntary services in youth work. And I am known to Sadiq Khan (London Mayor) for youth services.

It is my ambition to continue to support our young people in all areas, and against financial cuts across the UK affecting youth services.

I am the Programmes Director with Youth Focus: North East I am responsible for managing and coordinating our range of delivery programmes, supporting both young people and youth professionals, we provide in the region.

Since starting a career in Youth & Community Work in 1990 I have always strived to provide a high quality service which builds from the needs of young people and involves them as equal participants in the design, delivery and evaluation of the services they receive.

An Honours Graduate in Informal & Community Education, through YMCA George Williams College. I have worked extensively both within the statutory and voluntary youth sectors constantly delivering a high quality service which includes centre based, outreach, detached and schools work.