Digital Youth Work:

A Framework for Organizations to Update Their Policies to

Accommodate for Emerging Online Culture(s)
Safe OnLine Outreach Society
November 20091

INTRODUCTION

Institutional policy change can be one of the hardest obstacles to surmount at the
community level. With the rapid adoption of social media sites and online modes of
communication, gaps are widening between youth culture and adult acceptance of
online communications; between organizations’ policies and their staff’s activities
online; and between the focus on online predators and the promotion of innovative
online opportunities for youth services.

The Safe OnLine Outreach Society (SOLOS) (a non-profit organization in BC) is

mandated to increase the prevention of, and awareness surrounding, online
exploitation. Throughout the last several years, while delivering various workshops,
SOLOS has found that the policy structure governing youth-serving professionals
makes little sense in a time when their clients are extremely comfortable in an online
setting in which, to compound the problem, practitioners are forbidden to associate
with them. Also, SOLOS has found that many practitioners are adapting their
professional practice to include use of social networking sites (SNS) without support
from policy (Stoneman & Horton, 2009).

There can be little questions that changes in the youth work sector are imminent and
will be widespread. Not only here in B.C., but in youth-serving organizations
throughout the world, youth workers are recognizing that in order to be relevant
they are going to have to be online -- whether as teachers, role models and mentors
demonstrating safe internet practices; or as promoters of their programs and events
or as youth counsellors who supplement their face-to-face therapeutic relationships

1This document, and all other documentation derived from this proposal, will be licensed under Creative
Commons and will contribute to other discussions about policy development. It may not be used for commercial
purposes.
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with youth online it’s clear that the field of youth work faces many profoundly
interesting challenges in order to remain relevant and effective.

This work, however, is not a one-day workshop. These changes represent a

significant change to our practices. They will require difficult conversations. They will
require us to seek out our basic values and apply them in different media than the
past. They will turn upside down our assumptions of knowledge and age and
leadership. And they won’t be easy changes to make for those of us who count our
years in the field in decades, the changes we are about to witness in the human
services field will be beyond our imagination. They will be created, crafted and
championed by youth; by today’s eager students of social work, youth work and
psychology in our universities and colleges. If we are to hope to assist the next
generation of workers, we must now begin the work required to bring our practices
into the 21st Century. This work is dedicated to the youth workers of the future. May
our efforts today pave the way for their great leap forward tomorrow.

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The sub-questions orienting this review of policy will be: what are the barriers to
implementing new practices, and what are the implications of not dealing with these
challenges? What potential changes to child and youth care policy can be found in
new policy and practice innovations?

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This proposal outlines a comprehensive four-stage process that SOLOS will facilitate
for interested agencies that recognize the need to update policies and would like to
engage with SOLOS in order to support the process. 2

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Four Stages of Organizational Policy Reform

1. Survey organization to identify current online engagement and skills of staff.

This stage of the process will identify staff’s current access to SNS, engagement
with online social networking and the skills and resources they have to draw upon
within the organization. (See Appendix A). SOLOS will construct questionnaires to
be delivered both online and in-person to all staff. Results of the assessment will

2Much of the work presented in this proposal was developed by Tim Davies and Pete Cranston (2008) and is
used with permission of the authors.
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 be analyzed and the results will be presented, in a report to the organization, with
recommendations for the next stage.
a. Activities
i. Review of organizational structure and programs
ii. Creation of online survey of organization
iii.Approval of survey
iv. Posting of the survey
v. Follow up in-person with staff not represented in online survey
vi. Meeting with management staff to flesh out areas of concern and strengths
vii.Deadline
viii.Written summary report of findings presented to organization and staff
management team
b. Cost -

2. Review organization's existing policy and procedure documents and

recommend amendments and additions. This stage will consider the
involvement in, and safety implications of, online social networking for staff and
programs and will recommend options for policy reform.
a. Activities
i. Work with organization’s policy staff and identify sections in need of
revision and missing sections. (Including, but not limited to, policy and
procedure manuals, board orientation packages and various forms (i.e.
youth intake, risk assessment, pre-employment disclosure forms)
ii. Resolve policy conflicts and gaps
iii.Present content for internal policy and procedures approval process
b. Cost - Dependent on SOLOS’ level of involvement, presence of organization-
based policy staff

3. Provide skill development workshops to staff and/or board members to

address concerns and fears about online engagement, raise their awareness
of online youth culture and/or supplement their existing knowledge with a
broad perspective of online culture. This stage will include several training
events to target various levels of staff knowledge, interest and relevance.
a. Activities
1. Training events for board, management and frontline staff (these may be
separate events that provide instruction for different levels of knowledge
and will focus on the specific perspective of the target group)
2. Production of or access to concise, comprehensive instructional material
for staff members of all levels of interest and skill level. This may be web
based
b. Cost - Dependent on SOLOS’ level of involvement

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4. Strategy Development and Deployment. This stage will, in consultation with
staff and management, develop a short-term strategy for online engagement with
youth by the organization's staff. The strategy that will provide opportunities for
staff to use online social networking as a youth work tool, will provide a
standardized method of documentation and will provide parameters for
supervisors to monitor frontline staff’s online involvement.
a. Activities
i. Meetings with staff to establish desired level of online engagement by each
program or program area
ii. Initial strategy(ies) written and presented for approval by management and
board
iii.Revisions to proposed strategies for final approval
iv. Three month review of strategy and revision of irrelevant or ineffective
elements
v. Ongoing
b. Cost - Dependent on SOLOS’ level of involvement

Summary of four stages of policy review proposed here:

1. Survey organization to identify current online engagement and skills of staff
2. Review organization's existing policies and procedure documents and
recommend amendments and additions
3. Provide skill development workshops and resources to staff and/or board
members to address concerns and fears about online engagement, raise their
awareness of online youth culture and/or supplement their existing knowledge
with a broad perspective of online culture
4. Strategy Development and Deployment

These four stages will look different for each organization according to their client-
base, size, funding source and current level of online engagement. Variables for each
agency may include number of programs, staff knowledge of online culture,
characteristic of client base, program activities and financial commitment to the
process. For illustration purposes, the following two scenarios will illustrate possible
approaches.

Scenario One
The Hatzic Family Services Society (HFSS) has 16 employees, and operates a group
home, parent drop-in program and school-based drug and alcohol awareness
outreach program. They are governed by a six member board of directors. Recent
issues include: the group home workers have been receiving information that one of
their youth has posted ads for her sexual services on Craigslist, one of the parents at
the drop-in program has discovered pornography on her son’s computer and the
D&A worker has received text messages on her work cell phone. The executive
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director and group home manager are reluctant to allow the group home workers to
go online due to their inability to supervise or document staff viewing Craigslist but
have heard that staff have viewed the ads from their home computers. When the
executive director discusses her concerns at a board meeting, board members make
a motion to prohibit any staff from viewing a client’s personal content online. HFSS
policy and procedures manuals have been static for the last five years and make no
mention of online communications.

Stage One -Meeting executive director to go over issues

-Online survey design and collation
-Report and recommendations for next steps
Stage Two -Review of policies and procedures manual
-Report to executive of recommended amendments and additions to
existing policies
Stage Three -Three workshop presentations; one to the board of directors
articulating the case for updating of the organization’s professional
practices, and two workshops to staff (the first providing basic internet
use and safety awareness and the second educating frontline staff
regarding implications of online culture for clients; including specific
information about high-risk activities of youth online)
Stage Four -One workshop, co-facilitated with management to inform staff of
updated policies and procedures for those online activities approved
for use in their programs

Scenario Two
The Steelhead Community Services Society (SCSS) has 200 employees and operates
residential, outreach and school-based youth programs. Additionally, they host
computer labs on their site (as part of their employment readiness programs) and are
hoping to begin to supplement their existing services by offering online support to
their existing clients. They also recognize that they need to offer guidance and
instruction to their youth clients about their online safety. SCSS has a policy
development person on staff who is actively involved in online settings at home.

Stage One -Meeting executive director and management staff to go over

technological issues arising in various programs
-Online survey design and collation
-Report and recommendations for next steps, specifying activities for
stages two, three and four of the policy reform process
Stage Two -Consultation with organization’s internet policy development staff to
review policies and procedures manual

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 -Consultation with policy staff on preparation of report to organization’s
executive with recommendations for revisions
Stage Three -Workshop presentations; one to the board of directors articulating the
case for updating of the organization’s professional practices, one to
organization’s administrative and frontline staff promoting overall
internet safety awareness and relevance to agency’s use, and multiple
presentations to program staff to address specific areas of concern
-Production of educational resources for distribution throughout the
agency’s programs for frontline staff. These resources may be online,
written or in-person presentations
-Activities may include further analysis of the needs for specific
programs, reporting requirements of funders impacted by services
supplemented by online activities and/or review of policy revisions to
ensure that they make sense at the frontline
Stage Four -Program-specific consultations identifying two or three specific
interventions and/or strategies for programs to implement. Each
strategy will include specifics regarding approved activities,
requirements for documentation and procedures for reporting concerns

Evaluation of these policy updates will need to be iterative and ongoing. As new
online technologies arise and the activities of young people change and evolve, so
too will agencies’ need to update their practices and skills.

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Appendix A
Sample Questions for Organizational Survey

• Do staff have access to computers and to online social networking sites from their
office base?
• Do young people have access to online social networking sites through youth
service IT provision?
• Are there staff members with an existing understanding of online social
networking?
• How many staff have encountered (or are actively using) SNS?
• Are any staff trained to deliver online safety sessions?
• Are there any staff with specific technology skills?
• Are there young people with specific skills and experience who could advise and
support the service?
• Do staff and manager share a sense of the importance of engaging with online
social networking?
• Is your service already making use of online social networking? What different uses
are being made of SNS? Are there demands to make use of online social networking
which have not yet been met? Which SNS are used by the young people the service
works with?
• Do you have a policy or guidance for staff on online social networking? Does your
internet-use policy mention online social networking?
• Do you have other policies that apply to use of the internet or which can be easily
adapted to apply to use of the internet and online social networking by both young
people and staff?
• What guidance is provided for staff to manage their personal SNS profiles? Is there
a process for exploring new staff’s past online representations of themselves?
• Are reviews of personal online profiles a part of staff annual preformance reviews?
• Who is allowed to use SNS as part of their work? And in what ways are they allowed
to use SNS.
• How should youth workers manage their work SNS profiles?
• What methods of recording contact should be in place?
• What guidelines should exist for workers and young people about conduct in online
SNS spaces?
• How should workers deal with concerns about the safety or conduct of young
people?

Sources: “Social Media: What are you afraid of?” Elisa Birnbaum
November 23, 2009 http://www.charityvillage.com/cv/archive/acov/acov09/acov0936.asp)
and
Youthwork and Social Networking, Davies and Cranston, 2008

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