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Youth Conference Service Celebrates Triple Training Awards Win (20/10/2006)
The Youth Justice Agency’s Youth Conference Service (YCS) has won three prestigious training awards at a gala ceremony in Belfast City Hall on Tuesday 17th October for an innovative training programme that is behind the success of statutory restorative justice in Northern Ireland.A regional National Training Award was received for the Youth Conference Service Foundation Training, which recognises outstanding achievement and success through training and development, and a Business Eye Award for Promotion of Diversity and Social Inclusion.
The Youth Conference Service Foundation Training has also been selected for a United Kingdom National Training Award, which is the highest level of award that can be achieved in the UK. The Agency is one of only ten winning entries from Northern Ireland to gain this award which will be presented at a ceremony in London on 14th December.
The Youth Conference Service organises and facilitates conferences between victims of youth crime and young offenders aged between 10 and 17, to help the offender make amends to their victim for the harm caused.
Under the supervision of a Youth Conference Co-ordinator, the victim and offender come together to discuss the impact of the crime on the victim, to explore reasons why the young person committed the offence and agree what needs to happen to repair the harm and prevent the young person from re-offending.
Alice Chapman, Director of the Youth Conference Service, said: “Our unique training programme recruited 20 Youth Conference Co-ordinators and trained them to be able to deliver youth conferences throughout the province. With this being the first programme of its kind in Northern Ireland, we created a new post graduate course in conjunction with the University of Ulster, a Certificate in Restorative Practices, for the Co-ordinators to complete.
“The course was delivered over a twelve month period. By January this year, all 20 Youth Conference Co-ordinators had completed the course, achieved accreditations and were putting their knowledge to good use through the facilitation of conferences.
“The impact of the training has been evident in the high levels of victim engagement and satisfaction in the youth conferencing process. Independent research shows that two-thirds of victims have attended our conferences and over 90% have been satisfied with the outcome. This achievement is directly related to the level of skills demonstrated by the Co-ordinators and the amount of time they devote to listening to the victim and hearing what the victim needs to repair the harm, skills which were developed via the training course.
“All of the Co-ordinators have now embarked on the next phase of becoming advanced practioners in restorative justice and all are studying for their post-graduate diploma in Restorative practices with the University of Ulster. They will be the first group of students in the United Kingdom to achieve such accreditation.”
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