“FOR Youth keeps us at the forefront and pushes us to constantly review what we do/service we offer. It is young person focused and involves our young people in making decisions and having an input into shaping our service.”
“The biggest impact of FOR youth undoubtedly is externally - having that quality mark really helps us sell our service to others and serves as proof of the high quality we deliver.”
“The whole process generates a valuable Quality Development Plan, enabling clear purposeful and focused goals in order to create real change and improvements to the local Foyer service."
FOR Youth is our nationally recognised quality development and accreditation programme
It encourages services to aspire to excellence and provides guidance to help them get there. Endorsement and accreditation through our FOR Youth framework demonstrates that a service invests in young people's assets and potential, setting them apart from those that take a more deficit-based response.
FOR Youth is both a development tool, helping services to evaluate and strengthen Advantaged Thinking practices, and a quality assurance framework that powerfully demonstrates a service's impact and value to stakeholders.
What are the benefits?
The quality development programme followed up by the ongoing Partner membership relationship has both short term and long term benefits and will benefit the services operationally and strategically.
- Reflect on your service offer and plan improvements
- Prove your quality and impact internally and externally
- Build a better understanding and working practice in Advantaged Thinking
- Analyse and benchmark your service against national standards
- Engage your staff and young people in a quality assurance journey
What does it involve / what is included?
- Setup day(s)
- Advantaged Thinking & Trust Module and resource pack
- Initial commitment assessment resource
- Full commitment assessment framework
- SWOT and Quality Development Planning support
- Organisational data tool – captures each project’s outcomes each year to benchmark against other projects nationally
- 3 x support phone or video calls - done as a cohort when possible
- 2 day Validation visit.
- Accreditation report including data analysis
- Endorsement certification as decided by an independent panel
The accreditation framework incorporates the 7 tests of Advantaged Thinking and a theory of change model co-created with young people in Foyers and the University of Cumbria. The framework has three main sections: Focus, Opportunity, Results that look at the service from different angles.
We act as a coach rather than just an assessor and we are able to share good practice from our network and other sectors (including Foyers in Australia), provide practical resources and tools and build up an understanding of the strengths/weaknesses of the service(s) that helps to ensure we keep adding value.
Your service staff will benefit from participating in an online set-up workshop with three follow up support workshops to guide them through the process, and will have access to an online space for helpful resources along with on-going contact with our team.
96% of participants stated they are likely to continue with the FOR Youth quality assurance journey in following years
92% stated that they would recommend FOR Youth to another service
Who is it for?
FOR Youth is for youth supported accommodation projects (normally 10+ bedspaces) who are current members of the Foyer Federation or ready to become members.
Who is involved?
The process will involve a variety of staff, young people and key stakeholders. It will be led by our independent expert in asset-based working who has 20 years of quality assurance experience to help guide the staff's reflection, development and to positively challenge deficit based processes and practices ensures the service progresses. You will usually be part of a cohort of other services who are also engaged in the programme and can become a peer support group throughout the process.
What is the timeframe?
It usually takes a year to become endorsed through FOR Youth - more information on the process can be found below. In subsequent years we review the data and quality development plan with you and fully certify the services on an annual basis as part of being a Partner member.
How long does the accreditation last?
FOR Youth is not like other quality marks or accreditation as it is an ongoing quality development relationship that continues as part of your membership offer. All services that complete FOR Youth and become in endorsed move to our Partner member offer and receive ongoing quality review and support to keep the accreditation active.
How much does it cost?
£3000 per service
Plus 50% discount off your membership fee for the year leading to becoming accredited.
Note: if the service stops engaging with the process and we have to repeat elements of the process then we reserve the right to charge an additional fee to cover this cost.
PHASE 1: COMMITMENT
Month 1-4
- FOR Youth set-up
- Advantaged Thinking and Trust training
- Support in involving young people in your journey
- Data collection and communicating impact
- Initial Commitment Assessment
PHASE 2: ENDORSEMENT
Month 5-10
- Full Commitment Assessment
- Mapping of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT)
- Quality Development Plan (QDP)
- Final assessment and two-day validation visit
PANEL MEETING
Month 11-12
Independent panel meets to consider the final assessment report, data and submissions and agrees on an endorsement score for Strategic and Operational.
PHASE 3: CERTIFICATION (AND BEYOND!)
Year 2+
- Quality development visits
- Annual quality development reports
- Annual data analysis and reports
- Ongoing coaching to support continuation of your Quality Development Plan
- Training activities relevant to your offer
- Ongoing co-created FOR Youth tools and resources
"It's made us think and given us a framework against which to support new staff and understand more about the ethos and mindset of our Foyer.”
“The biggest benefit for managers is to stop and look in the mirror, seeing your service, warts and all, and measuring your starting point. Creating the QPD allowed teams to build on good practice already identified and put things in place to bring other areas up to speed. This in turn supported staff teams to get back to pre-pandemic levels particularly around engagement with young people. Involving all staff led to teams being more engaged and inspired”
“FOR Youth enables and encourages supported housing services to continuously build how they provide a service to the young people they work with. This empowers the young people to have a say in the support they receive and move on to be influential members of the communities they live within.”