6 Country Reports on Youth Work - Jugendpolitik in Europa

of full-time employees. Volunteers can be found primarily in non-profit organisations, but they
also play a role for public and semi-public providers. Their tasks are often at the functional
level, e.g. as trainers or mentors, but sometimes they also include administrative and
organisational aspects.
Table 45: Youth workers in Dutch municipalities
Total Full-time % Part-time % Volunteers %
Youth workers 570 15 3% 32 6% 523 92%
The full- and part-time employees, in contrast, work primarily for public and semi-public
providers, but sometimes also in larger sports associations. Their tasks cover all kinds of
activities, but most often contain some administrative and organisational elements. The
share of qualified youth workers, be it with a higher education degree or a professional
school certificate, is highest among public and semi-public providers. The share of trained
volunteers, however, is not so much connected to the type of provider but rather to the
activity the volunteers are involved in. Generally speaking, demanding activities also call for
a training of the volunteers involved. Examples of such demanding activities are exposure to
young people in problematic situations, training for competitive athletes, and work at parties
where many people get drunk and become abusive. Yet at the same time it should also be
mentioned that not all untrained volunteers lack qualifications in the field of youth work.
Several participants in this study reported that the volunteers in their organisation included
trainees and students of social work.
The ratio of female to male youth workers is balanced, but there are more female part-time
youth workers than male.
Table 46: Ratio of female to male youth workers in Dutch municipalities
Total Female % Male %
Full-time 15 7 47% 8 53%
Part-time 32 20 63% 12 38%
Volunteers 523 271 52% 252 48%
Concerning the participants in youth work activities, finally, it should once again be stressed
that they are not adequately captured with the definition of youth used in this project. In the
literature review, it was reported that the actual target group of Dutch youth work are persons
between 10 and 23 years of age. The section on national statistics showed that most
municipalities do not even serve this entire age span but rather concentrate on persons
between 12 and 16 years of age. With the age groups given for this project, one cannot
make such fine distinctions, but it nevertheless becomes obvious that persons aged 20 and
older are a marginal group in youth work.
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