Questioning Innovation with Jon Ord, episode 15

Talking Youth Work

Our guest this time is Jon Ord, Professor at the University of St Mark & St John, Plymouth, UK. During our conversation – besides the unavoidable Brexit theme and its consequences in UK Youth Work - he mentioned that some of the youth work that is still being done today is meant to “keep youngsters off the streets”, “keep them busy”, from a time when the streets were a danger. But times have changed. Now, many see a danger in screens and online activities. Young people have changed and so must the paradigms and the practices in youth work. Jon Ord also has a very interesting and critical point of view about what really means to innovate in youth work, he refers to it as a complex and multidimensional concept, and a very contextual one. Something that might be innovative in France might not be in Spain, and vice versa. For him, the definition of innovation is very much tied to business, to products and services, but youth work has still to find a better definition of innovation to suit its own needs. Another great talk to help us think how to improve our approaches. Let’s Talk Youth Work?