Newcastle City Council’s ruling Cabinet has been presented with findings and recommendations to improve support available to help the city’s young people into post-16 education, employment, and training.
NEET: not in education, work or training
A year-long Task and Finish Group was set up to explore what can be done by the council and its partner organisations to support those young adults who are not in education, work or training in Newcastle and to make sense how to prepare young people for the world of work.
Coun Stephen Lambert, Chair, Task and Finish Group, said:
”The issue of young people who are not in education, training, or employment, or at risk of becoming so, is a great tragedy for both our city, due to wasted talent and potential, and for the young adults themselves.
”We welcome the work the City Council and its partners are doing, however we believe more is needed to support young people most in need.
”We’re very grateful to everyone who has given their time to contribute to the work of the Task and Finish Group and we look forward to the feedback from Cabinet.”
Findings
The work of the group drew upon a wide range of sources and found that there are a number of barriers young people are facing in accessing education, paid work, and job related training.
The review highlighted that due to the cost-of-living crisis, increasing numbers of young people need a job due to low household incomes and that they can’t consider an unpaid study programme or education place.
Other barriers were the location of providers, their access, and associated costs such as travel as well as study programmes being mostly full time.
Recommendations
In response to their findings the four councillor group has made a number of recommendations including:
- An increase in the number of Level 1 post-16 study courses.
- An increase in the number of part-time study programmes.
- Increased funding to support Newcastle City Learning.
- Fund ”mentoring” for young people and support those at risk of becoming NEET.
- More opportunities for apprenticeships, work experience and supporting internships.
- More careers advisors especially for young people with Special Educational Needs.
Coun Alex Hay, Cabinet Member for a Thriving City at the Council said:
”As the future generation of our city it is of upmost importance that we support our young people with education and employment opportunities that best meet their needs. We would like to thank the Task and Finish Group for their hard work on this important area, and we will continue to work with them and our partners to ensure their recommendations are acted upon.”
The group pointed out that young people aged 16 to 19 are required to be in some form of full-time education, or to have begun an apprenticeship or traineeship, or spend 20 hours or more a week or volunteering while in part-time education or training.
In the UK there has been an increase in the number of young people who are aged 16 to 24 years and not in education, employment or training.
One in eight young people nationally are NEET with those lacking ”good” qualifications and with poor mental health facing particular disadvantages.
For 16 to 24-year olds in October to December 2023 the North East had the highest NEET rate of all the regions at 17.2%.
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