Connexions ‘Active Involvement’ agenda and integrated working

This research explores the links between Connexions ‘Active Involvement’ agenda and integrated working, and focuses upon local examples and interviews from Coventry and Warwickshire. Connexions One Stop Shops are taken as a particular focus of the report. Some of the issues arising from part of a wider national debate about the principles of statutory work with young people and the differences between professions and disciplines were explored as part of this work. This report highlights some of these important dilemmas, and indicates where there may be scope for further reflection or research by practitioners and strategists working in the integrated youth support services. The report features examples of how returning to the views of young people can be helpful in unlocking tensions. It also explores some of the different meanings, expectations and purposes of participation by young people within the context of youth support work. The report discusses the different theoretical bases of young people’s professions as they increasingly converge around the integrated working agenda. The key learning points from the research include: • the integrated working agenda throws up some genuine theoretical dilemmas about the basis on which different professionals are working with young people • co-located ‘hub’ working can force different services to confront the different ideological positions of their profession • young people’s participation can be one tool which helps professionals re-evaluate organizational priorities and unlock conflicts by reverting back to young people’s actual experiences