The independent voice of the voluntary youth sector

Established in 1936, the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services is a diverse and growing network of over 280 national organisations and regional and local networks that work with and for young people. Our mission is to work with our members from voluntary and community organisations to build thriving communities and sustainable networks that help all young people achieve their potential.

ResPublica and NCVYS launching Commission on Youth

ResPublica and NCVYS are delighted to announce a joint 12-month Commission on Youth, launching in April. Following our work with many youth organisations in the aftermath of the August riots, NCVYS has maintained commitment to help build solutions with members and partners to one of the worst waves of civil unrest in a generation.

For more information please click here.

NCVYS's new qualification for the young people’s workforce

Earlier this month, NCVYS were delighted to announce the release of two new Level 2 qualifications for the young people’s workforce. The award and certificate-sized qualifications are an excellent foundation for staff or volunteers in the voluntary and community sector working with young people. They cover three core areas: personal development; work-based skills and working with young people. It is the first time NCVYS have developed a qualification. For more information please click here.

yeah CIC info sheet now available!

Find out more about NCVYS’s community interest company and what we can do for you! Click here to take a look.

Young Partners Award 2012 - Nominations Open

Nominations for this year's Young Partners Award have been extended until 5pm on Friday 4 May 2012! If your organisation or project involves young people in the decision-making processes of your work or you know of another organisation who does, then why not nominate them for a prestigious awards? Further information about the awards, such as the awards process can be found here. To request for an application pack, please click here.

Recent events

The Keep the faith; Inter-faith seminar (funded by Catalyst) in Birmingham was a one-day, multi-sector, inter-faith seminar for facilitators, trainers and youth practitioners working with children, young people and families.

NCVYS, as part of the Department for Education's Overarching Strategic Partnership, has recently held a number events to support those working in the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector with children, young people and families. See the Overarching Strategic Partnership events page for more details and reports of all the events.

Consultation workshops on young people's services in London (26 March) and Birmingham (19 March) discussed how young people feel about services for them. The Eye of the Storm seminar was a one-day, multi-sector health and wellbeing seminar for service planners and practitioners. Policy classes looked at prominent areas of policy development including localism, education, safeguarding and benefit reforms . They brought together VCSE organisations to learn from each other about the impact of policy initiatives. The Unemployment roundtable shared knowledge of Rathbone’s perspective on youth unemployment.

NCVYS delivers step change for sector workforce

A NCVYS-led partnership has been commended by an independent evaluation report for its role in delivering a major young people's workforce initiative on behalf of the Children's Workforce Development Council. The Progress project was delivered in 2010/2011 and according to the report achieved a ‘strategic step change' in workforce development.

>>Read more about the report here

Catalyst consortium publishes reports into sector readiness for social finance

A new report from the Young Foundation, working as part of Catalyst, a consortium coordinated by the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services, argues that social finance could offer breathing space for the sector and greater freedom to innovate in their work with young people. Join us and play a pivotal role in communicating the experiences of organisations supporting millions of young people across England every day.

>> Read and download the Environment Charter here

NCVYS celebrates 75th anniversary

Seventy five years after founding the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services (NCVYS), leading youth organisations reunited in London on 26 May to celebrate the achievements of the organisation.

Attend the party conferences with NCVYS

NCVYS is attending all the party conferences this year and is pleased to invite you to be a part of the Youth Zone, a cost effective solution for our members to attend the conferences and showcase their work to leading politicians, councillors, businesses and party delegates.

John Lewis Chairman hosts inaugural NCVYS leadership masterclass

Charlie Mayfield, Chairman of the John Lewis partnership led the first of NCVYS's series of leadership masterclasses on Wednesday 30 March 2011. Held at the offices of event sponsors HW Fisher, Charlie spoke to delegates about the challenges of leadership and how leaders in the voluntary sector can empower their staff to prosper in a challenging climate.

>> Read more about the event here.

NCVYS welcomes Youth Action Network members

The National Council for Voluntary Youth Services (NCVYS) has welcomed members of Youth Action Network (YAN) into its network following YAN's formal announcement of closure. Youth Action Network's members voted unanimously to transfer the organisation's assets and members over to NCVYS at a Special General Meeting (SGM) on Wednesday 9 March. This comes after a period of consultation between the two membership organisations on how best to secure the long term future for the valuable intellectual property and member relationships built up over the years by YAN. Read more about this story here.

NCVYS & Department for Education bring together youth sector and young people at Positive for Youth Summit

The NCVYS and DfE Youth Summit has seen youth organisations come together with ministers to discuss and debate the key issues affecting young people. It was also an opportunity for these youth organisations to explore the possibility of partnerships to strengthen the youth sector. Ministers who spoke at the event included, the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Children and Families Minister Tim Loughton. >> Read more about this story here. >> See images from the event here.

NCVYS led consortium appointed as strategic partner to Department for Education

A consortium led by The National Council for Voluntary Youth Services (NCVYS) has today been appointed as the Department for Education's Strategic Youth Partner as part of a two year programme. The consortium, known as Catalyst, is led by NCVYS and supported by partners including the National Youth Agency (NYA), Social Enterprise Coalition (SEC) and The Young Foundation.
>> Read more about this story here.

Education Select Committee hears evidence from NCVYS Chief Executive

Susanne Rauprich, NCVYS Chief Executive gave oral evidence to the Education Select Committee alongside other leading figures from the voluntary and community youth sector.
>> Read more about Susanne's appearance at the Parliamentary Committee here.

NCVYS supports voluntary sector cuts website

NCVYS is pleased to support the launch of http://www.voluntarysectorcuts.org.uk/, an innovative and interactive tool to show how government spending cuts are taking their toll on the voluntary and community sector. >> Read more about the website and how you can get involved here.

NCVYS led project awards £30,000 in bursaries to voluntary sector

NCVYS are delighted to announce that 30 voluntary and community sector training providers will receive bursaries of £1,000 through the Children's Workforce Development Council's (CWDC) Progress project which NCVYS is leading. The bursaries will be distributed across England and will support the recipients to become accredited training centres. >> Read more about this story here.

Beyond the Comfort Zone

Our Director of Service Development, Beth has now completed her 184 miles along the Thames Pathway! This challenge raised money for young people within the NCVYS membership and raised the profile of the voluntary and community youth sector. You can find out how it went and what she is up to now on her blog here.

Building the Big Society with NCVYS

The NCVYS Big Society Blueprint

The NCVYS Big Society Blueprint was a pilot project to support six frontline organisations working with disadvantaged young people in order to highlight the great work they do and learn lessons from what infrastructure can do for locally based organisations. The six organisations were:

1. Getaway Girls 2. Just For Kids Law 3. Stockwell Park Community Trust 4. Crime prevention Health promotion Identify awareness Sports and fitness Education support Lifeskills and Mentoring (CHISEL) 5. The Arts Partnership (TAP) 6. The Baca project

The report is now available >> Learning from the Big Society Blueprint Project and if you have any questions or comments, please contact: Jarina Choudhury Development Manager (Networks & Learning) 020 7843 6453.

The NCVYS Big Society Placement Scheme

NCVYS members already work hard to support many of the 15 million young people in England. To support the principles behind the Big Society, NCVYS is offering placements to MPs with our member organisations. In this way we hope to offer politicians and those that support them access to the real work going on in communities today. If you are a parliamentarian or civil servant and would be interested in joining our placement scheme to see the big society in action being delivered by NCVYS members now! Please contact Faiza Chaudary.

Building enterprise - a sustainable big society with NCVYS

NCVYS's newly configured service development team will be working with members and networks to drive an enterprise culture within and across the NCVYS community. How do we propose to do that?

Evaluating member feedback to ensure existing services are relevant to sector needs;
Collaborating on the development of enterprising activities across the organization, which place young people and/or the benefit of young people at their core;
Brokering relationships between members; ensuring those partnerships work and thus empowering the sector;
Incorporating a CIC as a trading arm to NCVYS, to mainstream, market and license products developed with or by the membership;
Advocating to the new government the need for sustainable approaches to service delivery
And finally, to keep it fun, we'll be launching an exciting fundraising campaign very soon for the benefit of our members ... For more information please contact Beth Parker, Director of Service Development

View the photos from the latest NCVYS events

See the latest photos from all NCVYS's events including the Annual Conference and AGM 2010, the NCVYS Parliamentary Event, and the NCVYS youth zone at party conference here.

Exchange issue 12: Citizenship

The latest issue of NCVYS's termly magazine Exchange is now online. Readers can view this issue on ‘Citizenship'. View archive issues of Exchange magazine here. Exchange is a termly national magazine which brings together a unique collection of news, policy analysis and practical advice for voluntary and community organisations and networks working with and for young people. Read the magazine here.

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