The Conference “Space for (youth) growth” (Rotterdam, October 2025), was an event format of the Youth Work Talks series which is organised by the Growing Youth Work SNAC. The subtitle of the conference was “Building cross-sectoral alliances in the changing political climate”, which provided the thematic focus of the conference. The overall aim was to facilitate building cross-sectoral alliances in the changing political, social and economic climate for young people’s personal and civic growth. This article summarises the keynote speech which was provided by Dermot O’Brien from Bray in Ireland. Continue reading and learn about the challenges young people are facing today and how youth work can and should respond to these challenges by connecting with other sectors.
Written by Nik Paddison
Dermot has experienced just about every level of youth work: He started out as a young person attending a youth club, became a youth worker, teaches youth work in formal education, trains youth workers in non-formal education, became a mentor, writes about youth work, and at the political level was the Chairperson of Bray town council.
Dermot presented six challenges that young people express that they are facing in these turbulent times. He specifically used the word “turbulent”, explaining that it represents for him, disorder, chaos, instability, a lack of predictability, and less clarity about the future.
These challenges are not something he has come up, they are based on what young people are sharing with him, these are their points of view. He concluded by reflecting on the power of a cross-sectoral approach in supporting young people to deal with these challenges and for seeing both their personal and civic development grow.
“Young people are saying to me everything is loud. Everybody has something to say but no one in power is listening.” (Dermot 2025)
Noise without listening equals numbness. Numbness is not about apathy, it is about young people protecting themselves because they are overwhelmed. The challenge to youth work is, are the environments that youth work offers reacting to this noise and numbness, is youth work offering an alternative of ‘silence’ and listening?
Often young people are told that they are the future or that they should look forward to their future. Yet, already as young people they are already experiencing housing that is out of reach, jobs that are insecure, peace that is unstable, and even the survival of the planet being questioned.
How much should youth work be pushing a message of “hope” when young people’s ambitions are already crushed? What is the role of the spaces where youth work happens when the young people only see a fragile future?
The current state of the world is what the adult generations have created and are leaving for these next generations. “Be the change you want to see in the world”, is a commonly used statement, yet the current adult generations are not interested in listening to the changes young people propose for their own futures!
Young people are often being told they “are the future” or alternatively that they are the “now”. However, they are actively being denied any power to have any control over the future or even to be the now! Young people are also sharing that they feel like they are the cleanup crew for adult messes and failures.
Many young people are finding it hard to fit in when the world is so fractured and polarised. This environment encourages a hyper-individualised reality and young people respond with “forget the collective, I am just going to focus on me because that is what I can control.”
Young people are pointing out that they have marched for climate, they have cried for their mental health, they have pleaded for fair working conditions, and they have mobilised for Palestine. They feel they have risked everything.
Sadly, the most successful adults who are offering a sense of belonging often represent forces that are driven by hate and division. So how is youth work pushing back on this? How are young people being invited into spaces where belonging means being seen, heard, valued, trusted, and respected?
Young people are pointing out that they have marched for climate, they have cried for their mental health, they have pleaded for fair working conditions, and they have mobilised for Palestine. They feel they have risked everything. Young people are wondering about the impact of their contributions because they don’t see any real change and they hear only silence or condescending criticism.
How does youth work push back against civic silence? What is youth work doing to show and prove that it is worth the effort and that change can and does happen?
Every young person was born into a rules-based order. On the global scale these things are called the Security Council, the UN, the courts for justice, different institutions for peace, and treaties for our rights. Young people are appearing in court for crimes they may have committed at a local level and yet they see crimes happening at a global level that are not going to court. Their response is, why follow the rules?
Youth work needs to hold spaces where there is truth telling and where there is honesty. The fractures should not be ignored, dismissed or hidden because the young people see and they will judge.
Dermot re-worked a quote by the American writer and teacher Margaret Wheatley, “if you can't prevent the collapse, you need to decide who you want to be during the collapse.” Youth work needs to be bringing values, experiences, knowledge, and belief in what's possible.
(The actual quote is, “We can’t change this world, but we can change ourselves so that we can be of service to this world” Margaret J. Wheatley, Who Do We Choose To Be? Facing Reality, Claiming Leadership, Restoring Sanity).
Dermot provided an example of youth work making a difference with the story of a young person he worked with. By the age of 12 this young person had lost his oldest brother to a drowning accident, the second oldest brother was murdered in prison in a gang feud, and the third oldest brother took his own life.
Through the trauma he became a very angry, violent, destructive, and self-destructive young man and ended up in prison. Dermot visited him in prison, and when he came out, he went to the youth centre. Dermot offered him the possibility to become a volunteer, which he agreed to. He never committed a crime again. He is now in his mid-30s, he is a father, and runs his own business.
The success stories of Youth Work must not be forgotten because they are the glue that keeps communities connected.
Youth work could not prevent his trauma, it couldn't stop him from going to prison. But youth work being present through the actions of the youth worker carried human dignity to the young man.
Although this is an important example, it is worth remembering that youth work working is not just about the big wins. In reality the success of youth work means looking into the community and seeing who are the good parents, who are the good neighbours, and who is helping out locally. These are the success stories that must not be forgotten because they are the glue that keeps communities connected.
If we work at the different pieces fitting together, then they will work together. The how we do it, the why we do it, and the results coming from it are proof that it's worth doing. What is often lacking is the proof that it works. Not just proof to the different sectors but also to young people. They need to see that health and sport and youth work can work together in a way that benefits them and can promote change.
Looking to the future, youth work needs to consider how it will carry itself alongside all the sectors who work together for young people and with young people.
Dermot concluded with a challenge to the youth work community of practice. Often youth work responds to the threats and the crises – something like a sandbag being used when there is a flood. However, a sandbag is temporary, the impact is in the moment, but it is temporary and is not sustainable.
Whereas, a dam, while not guaranteed to last forever, makes space and opportunity for the management of the risk. Working with other sectors to create the dams would mean youth work being rooted in the responses that make a difference when there is a threat. And in this moment in time the young people are saying there are a lot of threats.