MAKCEES Commonwealth Higher Education Consortium for Youth WorkTechnical workshop for the delivery of the Youth Work Degree

Higher Education Consortium for Youth Work (CHEC4YW) Technical workshop for the delivery of the Youth Work Degree – Held at Namibia College of Open Learning (NAMCOL), Windhoek, Namibia 08-10 May 2019

The Coordinator for the Bachelor of Youth Development Work (BYDW) Mr. Tumwesigye Tibs Jimmy together with Ms. Nuluyati Nalwadda, a facilitator on the program attended the Commonwealth Higher Education Consortium for Youth Work (CHEC4YW) Technical workshop for the delivery of the Youth Work Degree – Held at Namibia College of Open Learning (NAMCOL), Windhoek, Namibia 08-10 May 2019. Other participants were drawn from NAMCOL, the Open University of Botswana, the University of Malawi, The Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Malawi, University of Venda, South Africa, the Ministry of Youth, Namibia and local NGOs working with Youth; as well as from the UK National Youth Agency and the UK Professional Association of Lecturers in Youth and Community Work.

This workshop was convened by Mr. Layne Robinson, Head of Social Policy Development and Dr. Amina Osman Adviser, Social Policy Development on behalf of the Commonwealth Secretariat. The capacity buildingworkshopfocused on strategic aspects of improving the Bachelor of Youth Development Work degree and strengthening capacity of civil society; Higher Education Institutions and the faculty; to handle the noble cause. Key areas tackled included:

• Becoming familiar with the Youth Work degree programme
• Content design and delivery
• Understanding the programme architecture
• Teaching and learning in Virtual Environments
• Instructional design and contextualization of Courses
• Integrating theory and practice
• Supervision and building critically reflective practitioners.

On the future of Youth Work Education and training, Commonwealth of learning and Commonwealth Secretariat highlight the following as a roadmap:

1. Recognition of youth work as a professional category in legislation and policy in order to ensure strategies and investment.
2. Establishing Professional Associations for Youth Workers for collectivizing.
3. Building competency standards for youth work practice
4. Developing ethical standards for youth work practice
5. Building certified qualification pathways for youth work from short courses to PhD (Competency-based)
6. Establishment of Consortium of Academic Institutions to deliver a YW Degree and Diploma in Youth Work.
7. Professional quality assurance/supervision

At Makerere University, since we have already started the Bachelors Degree of Youth Development work, we can take lead in this endeavour. However serious action needs to be taken to:

• advertise the programme to the wider audience
• strengthen University – Government collaboration particularly with the State Minister of Youth and children Affairs and Ministry of Education
• Building more capacity and re-orientating the tutors handling the BYDW programme
•  Call for attitude change amongst staff and students
• Subsidizing the program and provision of scholarships to learners as a key to increasing enrolment.
• Offering top-up degree to those with CYP Diploma
• Continuous collaboration with Commonwealth of Learning and The Commonwealth Secretariat
• Register the Youth Work program with the Transnational Qualification Framework (TQF) for Internalization, easy credit transfers and enhancing student mobility.

Writter:

Tumwesigye Tibs Jimmy

Coordinator BYDW