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Papadopoulos (2010 95 ), provide some information on the skills
developed during youth activities but refer to flexible school-based
programmes only and not to programmes from youth organisations
- the focus of our report.
There are virtually no studies on the extent to which the development
of soft skills in the youth sector affects the employability of young
people (RQ4). To take one example, the Yoyo research project 96
contains useful information regarding the experiences of young
people during their transitions from school to work, based on
extensive interview work (280 interviews of young people). However,
while the project explores the potential of youth organisations to
engage individuals who are disengaged in the formal education
sector, it did not review the situation of young people who were not in
their transition from school to work, and did not specifically examine
the importance of skills development in the youth sector for
employability.
Moreover, much of this literature relies on anecdotal or case-based
evidence 97 . Available evidence tends to point out the importance of
soft skills for employers and suggests that youth activities can be a
way in which this kind of skills can be developed. Given the relative
lack of systematic research in this area focusing on the youth sector,
the literature review in relation to RQ4 makes use of a related strand
of literature on extra-curricular activities and volunteering, which are
considered a proxy for youth activities – although evident differences
between volunteering and participation in youth organisations by
young people exist. This literature has the advantage of providing
more and better evidence thanks to the use of stronger
methodological designs and larger sample sizes. There is in principle
no a-priori reason why employers should value less participation in
youth organisations than volunteering activities - something that is
confirmed recent by our analysis of Eurobarometer survey data, as
detailed below in chapter 4.
Given the relative lack of systematic research on the soft skills
developed through non-formal education in the youth sector and
their acceptance by employers, it is not surprising that there is also
a scarcity of research in relation to more specific questions for this
study, on the extent to which young people are aware of the skills
and competences that they develop through involvement in youth
organisations and how to present them to employers (RQ3) and
other ways than skills development in which participation in youth
organisations enhances employability (RQ5). Again, in relation to
these aspects there is a range of case-based evidence that young
95 Broadbent , R. S. and Papadopoulos, T. (2010) ‘We didn't even realize that kids like us could go on the radio’ – an
evaluation of a Victorian schools youth development programme, Journal of Youth Studies, vol.13:2, pp.235-254.
96 Bois-Raymonds, M., Plug, W., Stauber, B., Pohl, A. and Walter, A. (2002) How to avoid cooling out? Experiences
of young people in their transitions to work across Europe. Yoyo research project.
97 See for instance Uyttersprot, J. P. (2012) ‘Does recognition lead to jobs?’ Coyote, n.18, pp. 28-31. Salto Youth
(2011) Bridges to Work: creating better chances for young people on the labour market. Chapter 6. Salto Youth,
Antwerp.
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