The partnership will champion young people’s health needs whilst providing a conduit for youth organisations, the state and young people to work towards reducing health inequalities.
The partnership is led by the Association for Young People's Health and includes: Addaction, Ambition, Brook, StreetGames, and Youth Access. Currently the partnership is part of the VCSE Health and Wellbeing Allicane.
Uniquely, the Partnership reaches a massive network of local agencies. This means it can deliver services to young people and young people’s organisations on an unprecedented scale. Each partner is contributing specialist expertise, resources, volunteers or training programmes to this initiative.
This current partnership was formed in April 2017, but was originally initiated in 2013.
Our aims are:
Addaction works locally by brokering partnerships to support the range of young people with whom they work. Nationally they also develop partnerships to evidence best practice and influence the commissioning and delivery of young people’s services. This approach has given them extensive links with specialist and universal children, family and adult services and clients in the schools, primary health and criminal justice sectors. They are active participants in national forums such as the Youth Taskforce and the Transitions2Adulthood Alliance.
Ambition is a leading national body and youth charity, reaching half a million young people every year across the UK. They strengthen community organisations working with young people in 3,500 local communities and influence national and local government to champion the value of young people’s services and the importance of strong youth policies.
Association of Young People’s Health (AYPH) brings together 850 professionals and organisations across the UK to improve young people’s health and well-being. They aspire to develop high quality practice, working through their networks to:
Brook is the UK’s leading provider of sexual health services and advice for young people under 25. The charity has 45 years’ experience of working with young people and provides free and confidential sexual health information, contraception, pregnancy testing, advice and counselling, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections and outreach and education work, reaching more than 290,000 young people every year.
StreetGames is a sports charity that changes lives and communities. They do it by supporting a network of projects that give sports and volunteering opportunities to young people in disadvantaged communities across the UK. Doorstep sport is StreetGames’ delivery method, whereby they bring sport close to the home in disadvantaged communities at the right time, for the right price, to the right place and in the right style.
The aim of each StreetGames project, accredited by StreetMark, is to be sustainable and become part of the fabric of the community. This leads to stronger and safer communities, a championing of social action and volunteering, as well as improved health and wellbeing.
Youth Access is the national membership organisation for young people's information, advice, counselling and support services (YIACS). YIACS provide a holistic response to young people’s social, emotional and mental health needs through a range of services provided ‘under one roof’, including social welfare advice, advocacy, counselling, health clinics, community education and personal support. Youth Access is very involved in work to improve young people’s access to age-appropriate mental health services, e.g. through the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Coalition and the CYP IAPT (Improving Access to Psychological Therapies) programme.
Takeover Day is the national event where public, private and voluntary sector organisations give young people the opportunity to be involved in decision making about issues that affect their lives. Coordinated by the Office of the Children’s Commissioner for England, it’s a chance for organisations to engage directly with the young people who access their services. This means young people can be involved with decision making and influence policy and practice, to develop better services.
As a partnership we have led several Takeover Days over the last few years.
We are now encouraging you to carry out your own Takeover Day. View and download our Takeover Toolkit for helpful advice.
Confidentiality and safeguarding within a youth volunteering context
YPHP have worked with young people and professionals to develop this guidance in order to enhance the confidence of professionals to engage young people in health and social care volunteering opportunities, ensuring that they feel confident balancing their duty of care towards young volunteers, whilst also upholding young people’s rights.
Youth social action
YPHP have developed a series of case studies demonstrating good practice examples of youth social action projects.