Youth Futures Foundation

Preventing ethnic and economic inequalities for young people due to Covid

Our approach

We approached the Youth Futures Foundation to fund an inclusive, participatory approach to understanding the lived experiences of young people from different ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds, and co-create solutions.

We recruited and trained diverse young people to design and deliver research ‘with and for’ young people, not just ‘about’ them. We engaged participants not as ‘respondents’ but as stakeholders and co-producers.

The problem

By April 2020, barely a month into the COVID lockdown, youth unemployment was already 3 times the national average. Ethnic minority people were twice as likely to have lost their jobs than White British people. Their household income had reduced by 46%, compared to 28% for White British households. And 70% of young people were reporting mental health issues. Something needed to be done to ensure these problems did not result in entrenched inequalities.

Insight

We learned about the holistic impact of COVID on just on young people themselves but on their whole families, and how these varied based on class, age, ethnicity and gender, as well as family support.

Young people shared innovative and directional views about how to make career advice, apprenticeship programs, and entrepreneurship support more effective. They identified wider emotional and practical help needed to minimise the impacts of COVID.

Impact

Both peer researchers and participants were left empowered. Insights fed into the government’s flagship employment program for young universal credit claimants: Kickstart. The work shifted the narrative about young people, by recentering on their strengths, not just their ‘problems’. It won the MRS ‘Audience Award’, as assessed by the global market research community.

Accolade

2021 MRS IMPACT Audience Award

“So much of our understanding is based on official statistics, large-scale surveys and modelling. This information has pride of place in policy discussions. Here, we asked the questions ‘Whose voice - and whose data - matters?’ and we privileged the type of information that you only get from engaging with [underserved] people more directly and gaining views about their whole lives.

By giving under-represented people a seat at the table, we painted a more nuanced picture of their experiences and needs, and could speak better to policies that might support them. We gave young people a chance to shift the narrative about what they have to offer, their resilience, and the potential value they add to society and to their workplaces, instead of being framed as a ‘problem’. Their aspirations and potential come front and centre.”