Our Annual Report - YouthNet

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Trustees’ report ACHIEVEMENTS AND PERFORMANCE (continued) 2. Supporting young people and others into volunteer (continued) We also began a new project called Do-it Connect, fundedd by the Cabinet Office’s Innovation in Giving fund, managed by NESTA. YouthNet were the only charity to be successful in the first funding round, and the funding will enable us to put in place key developments to get more people volunteering. One aspect is Open ID, to integrate user FaceBook profiles with Do-it their Facebook pages. The other is to research and develop a ‘reverse’ search functionality, to enable charities needing volunteers to make a direct approach to and make it easier for volunteers to highlightt what they are involved in within registered volunteers on Do-it with the skills they need to get involved. In 2011, YouthNet and Age UK were chosen as official partners for the Virgin London 2013 Marathon. The project at the heart of our success was about bringing young and old together throughh training young volunteers to use their t passion for digital technology, t and enabling older people to adopt the benefits of online. YouthNet has a ‘VIP’ group of runners who are made up off young people who havee used or been involved in TheSite, and individuals from a range of f our corporate funders and staff. Overall theree will be a 600 strong ‘Run forr it’ team running in April 2013. This T is also the first year when Virgin Money will be combining the official partners for the t marathonn with Charity of the Year across their banks, to engage staff and customers in fundraising forr the charities. We have also worked in partnership with the National Youthh Agency, who have been funded by the British Council to inform and engage young people with the t potential to volunteer through the Youth in Action European Union U opportunities. NYA approached YouthNet to help with this work and reach out to young y people. We have helped shape a clear communications strategy, based upon research, to understand what would motivate young people to get involved, and supported engagement through conten creation and digital media to publicise thee opportunities. Volunteers at YouthNet Volunteering is at the heartt of YouthNet and essential to TheSite to ensure we get our services right forr young people. We seee a vital role for young volunteers to develop digital and counselling expertise – to give them tangible skills - and to deliver the support for other young people. YouthNet benefits from the support of o over 200 volunteers to help us deliver our work. They are fundamental to delivering our services s and help across a wide range of areas, from photographers, ‘Leaders’, in the office, , as moderators for the live chats and community boards, and peerr advisers on askTheSite. YouthNet also recognises the important role volunteering can n play for young peoplee in helping them to develop their skills, improve their employability and contribute to other areas of their personal development. Volunteers are offered training to enable them to carry out their roles confidently and knowledgably across three key service areas; 13
Trustees’ report ACHIEVEMENTS AND PERFORMANCE (continued) 2. Supporting young people and others into volunteer (continued) TheSite online community - Each year we trainn approximately 15 volunteers to help moderate and provide support on TheSite.org online community services. Each volunteer has to learn the skills neededd to in fostering a supportive community and ensuring users on TheSite, however vulnerable, never feel left out. They learn thee balance between stepping back to encourage young people to support each other o and stepping in, when needed, to signpost to more specialist expert support. TheSite’s askTheSite service - Volunteers also play a role in our offering young people access to expert support. Over the last year we' ve involved over 30 young people ass volunteer peer advisors. Supported by expert relationships advisors, TheSite's peer advisors have helped to answer over 250 questions about relationships issues i from young people contacting askTheSite. We' ve developedd a brand new training programme for our peer advisors who are coached and supported them over a six month programme by expert relationships advisors. This approach combining c volunteering with learning opportunities, helps ensure that our volunteers learn and grow inn confidence as they provide a crucial service for their peers. 3. Providing the right r support, in the right place at the right time Volunteers at YouthNet (continued) TheSite Live Chats - TheSite’s volunteers have been instrumentall in helping TheSite to offer real-time support through live group chats four times a week throughout the year. Last year 3,500 young people took part in these live discussions where young people are able to help and get help on all kinds of personal issues including mental health, relationships, sexual health, work and study. TheSite.org on mobile The last year hass seen significant development in expanding our mobile services and reaching young people off our site within social media and partner activity. In November, we relaunched TheSite.org's package of mobile services. This includes a revamped Local Advice Finder mobile service that enables young people to search for local services in their area. The package also includes making TheSite's communityy discussion boards fully accessible on mobile, and provides one click access to TheSite's videos and social media sites. All of these services are available across all of the main operating systems s and formed the first f phase in re- developing our mobility of support for young people. As part of our staff Fedex day in December, in response to user demand, we integrated TheSite's community discussion boards with Tapatalk, a mobile app built specifically for forum access. It's enabled TheSite to reach new users via Tapatalk. It's also increased the options that TheSite's users have to access the boards via their mobile devices. Winner of the 20111 HSBC Youth Businesss Awards Tapatalk has over a millionn users; it costs $2.99, and is the No. 1 Android app for social, paid apps, and in the Top 5 for iPhones. Work is also underway to update the software that runs the Community Boards to look at prototyping a vBulletin Mobile App to enable a dedicated app for TheSite community boards. 14
Page 2 and 3: YouthNet UK Annual Report and Conso
Page 4 and 5: Reference and administrative inform
Page 6 and 7: Statement from the Chief Executive
Page 8 and 9: Trustees’ report STRUCTURE, GOVER
Page 10 and 11: Trustees’ report ACHIEVEMENTS AND
Page 24 and 25: Trustees’ report PLANS FOR THE FU
Page 26 and 27: Trustees’ report FINANCIAL REVIEW
Page 28 and 29: Trustees’ report STATEMENT OF TRU
Page 30 and 31: Independent auditor’s report Opin
Page 32 and 33: Balance sheets as at 30 June 2012 N
Page 34 and 35: Principal accounting policies Year
Page 36 and 37: Notes to the financial statements Y
Page 38 and 39: Notes to the financial statements Y
Page 40: Notes to the financial statements Y

Our Annual Report - YouthNet

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