Conclusion from Sarah Wylie’s Independent research in 2003.

Spreydon Youth Community is a large, multi-faceted youth organisation, providing a wide range of services grounded in Christian principles for young people from throughout the city? and especially
South Christchurch. SYC has taken a very strategic approach in its programme planning, aiming to meet the needs of a wide range of young people in terms of age, interests and spiritual, social and emotional needs. Its approach is well-grounded in research evidence concerning “what works” in youth development.

SYC’s programme fits well with the Youth Development Strategy Aotearoa, the action plan for child and youth development compiled by
New Zealand’s Ministry of Youth Affairs in 2002, and itself based on the research literature concerning best practice youth work. SYC’s approach is largely cognisant of the cultural and socio-economic context in which young people live, and also fits well with the Youth Development Strategy in that it enhances the connectedness of young people by significantly widening the social networks of most young people who engage in its activities and by offering young people strong mentoring relationships with caring, concerned people older than themselves. Through its Care Groups, Green Teams leader matching to young people, leadership training, studies and through its range of recreational activities, SYC builds on young people’s strengths. enhancing proven protective factors including faith, social supports and positive social interactions, friendships, law-abiding peer groups, employment (voluntary and paid), empathy and problem solving ability and attachment to a community.

Likewise, SYC works well to address risk factors associated with poor outcomes for young people (eg. Truancy, unsafe sexual behaviour, offending, self harm). Feedback from young people and leaders associates the SYC experience with enhanced self esteem, strengthened social supports, improved school performance and direction, a break from stresses at home, a source of stability, and opportunities for young people from low income families. SYC is strongly relationship-based, another element well in line with the Strategy, and provides numerous opportunities for young people to actively participate in SYC structures and events.

The last key aspect of the Youth Development Strategy Aotearoa is the principle that youth development needs to be continually informed by effective research, evaluation and information gathering. SYC has demonstrated its commitment to this principle via the present evaluation, and the on-going training of all this leaders from the top down. Within SYC, there does appear to be room for improvement in terms of information flow, a necessity heightened by the size of SYC. Parents, young people and leaders all need to be kept “in the loop” regarding SYC activities. While this is working well in many cases, there is also room for improvement.

In terms of its own objectives, SYC is working well. SYC is a loving, caring community, with a strong identity. Several of the those involved who were interviewed by the researcher identified it as their church, the place where their friends are, where their supports are, where they worship, the source of their spiritual encouragement and growth, and where they access many of their social and recreational activities. SYC is a powerful source of mentoring, leadership opportunities and experience, a source of purpose and personal growth and a safe and fun place for young people.

SYC does not have a stated objective concerning its relationship with
Spreydon
Baptist
Church or its other youth ministries. Throughout the evaluation, SYC did appear to be in many ways quite separate to the church, yet many parties from all sides wanted to see SYC, SBC and parts such as Cross Over Trust and the Young Adults Ministry working more closely together in the future. While efforts to achieve this do take time, there did appear to be a willingness amongst key stakeholders to see this happen. Closer alignments with SBC in terms of administration of SYC would avoid the considerable duplications which currently exist, and would ease the workload of SYC’s administrative officer. This could in turn free up valuable SYC resources for other uses.

Having recently undergone significant turnover in its leadership team as a result of leaders ‘growing up” and moving on, SYC now has is largest leadership team ever, but with many leaders relatively new to the job. Throughout 2003, these leaders have been developing in the role. With strong support in the future, and further consolidation of the existing structure and programmes. SYC is set to continue being a trail blazer in Christian youth work in
New Zealand. Establishment of the monitoring systems recommended in the present report will enable future evaluation of SYC’s programmes employing a more robust, quantitative approach, providing more definitive feedback on its performance. In terms of the qualitative data gathered in the present evaluation, the future for SYC appears bright.