Isle of Wight Youth Justice Service: Developing More Well-Rounded Practitioners

Building broader knowledge, practical skills and professional confidence

For Youth Justice Services, developing practitioners with a broad understanding of the sector is essential to delivering effective interventions and supporting better outcomes for children and young people.

The Level 5 Youth Justice Practitioner apprenticeship provides a structured route for professionals to develop their knowledge and practical capability while continuing to apply their learning within the workplace.

For the Isle of Wight Youth Justice Service, the programme is supporting the development of a practitioner beyond their existing specialist role, broadening their understanding of the wider Youth Justice landscape and creating opportunities to learn from colleagues across the country.

The Challenge

Practitioners can develop significant expertise within their individual roles, but opportunities to broaden their understanding of the wider Youth Justice landscape can be limited by the demands and focus of day-to-day practice.

The apprenticeship provides exposure to a wider range of topics, approaches and current practice developments, while also creating opportunities for national peer learning through the cohort model.

The Impact

From Matthew Woodhouse, Deputy Manager at Isle of Wight Youth Justice Service:

“(Learner) has found the programme to be a very positive and valuable experience. It is supporting her professional learning and development and is helping her build both the knowledge and practical skills required within Youth Justice. Importantly, it is broadening her understanding beyond her current Restorative Justice role, enabling her to develop into a more well-rounded practitioner with a greater appreciation of the wider Youth Justice landscape.

The programme is providing exposure to a range of topics, approaches, and current practice developments that she may not otherwise encounter within her day-to-day role. This is enhancing her confidence and helping her to consider how different interventions and methodologies can be applied in practice. Another significant benefit has been the opportunity to learn alongside Youth Justice colleagues from across the country. The cohort model has enabled valuable networking, the sharing of ideas and good practice, and discussions around the different challenges and approaches being taken within Youth Justice Services nationwide. This peer learning element has been particularly beneficial and has helped broaden perspectives beyond the local context.

Overall, from both (learners) perspective and ours as a service, the apprenticeship is proving to be a worthwhile investment in her development and is contributing positively to her growth as a practitioner.”

Developing Youth Justice Capability Across Local Authorities

The case study demonstrates the value of combining structured professional development with practical workplace application and peer learning.

For Youth Justice Services, this approach can support practitioners to broaden their expertise, strengthen confidence and develop a more rounded understanding of the challenges, approaches and opportunities across the wider sector.

Intelligencia Training partners with local authorities to develop specialist workforce capability across Youth Justice, ASB, intelligence, counter fraud, cyber security and protective security.

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