Helping a young person back into education or work rarely comes down to one or one training course. Confidence, transport, health, housing and past experiences of school can all sit between somebody and their next opportunity.
More than 70 people who work with young adults across the Tees area met at Teesside University to look at those barriers together. The Unlocking Potential conference brought practitioners into the same room to exchange ideas about supporting people described in official statistics as NEET, meaning not in education, employment or training.
A problem bigger than a label
Teesside University’s account of the event noted that more than one million young people are in that position nationally. The number is striking, but the label can hide very different lives. One person may need a qualification, another help with anxiety, and another an employer willing to look beyond a patchy CV.
The conference was delivered with the and Stockton-on-Tees Borough Council, with North East Uni Connect also involved. That mix matters because no single organisation holds every route a young person might need. Colleges and universities can open options, councils can connect local services, and employers understand where jobs and skills shortages are emerging.
Discussion also included the local Youth Trailblazer work for 18 to 21-year-olds. Nationally, the is intended to test more joined-up support for young people at risk of long-term economic inactivity. Its value on Teesside will depend on whether that support feels simple to access rather than like another set of appointments and referrals.
Showing what a next step can look like
Alongside the professional event, 25 local people visited the university campus to explore health and digital routes. A campus visit may sound modest, but unfamiliar buildings and uncertainty about who belongs at university can be real obstacles. Meeting staff and seeing facilities turns an abstract option into somewhere a person can picture themselves.
The strongest support usually combines aspiration with practical help. Encouragement has more weight when it comes with a bus route, an introduction, a realistic entry requirement and somebody who follows up after the first meeting.
Conferences do not create jobs by themselves, and the national figures will not move because practitioners swapped business cards for a day. The useful test is what happens next: whether contacts are kept, gaps between services close and young people receive a plan that fits their circumstances.
Early contact can also prevent a temporary gap from becoming a much longer absence. A young person waiting for the right course or recovering from a setback may not need an intensive programme, but they do need someone to notice if weeks are turning into months. Shared local relationships make that handover easier.
Still, the Tees area has taken a sensible starting point. It has brought the people working on the same challenge together and included young adults in activity on the campus itself. For anyone who has felt written off by the letters NEET, that joined-up can be the beginning of a more hopeful description: student, apprentice, colleague or founder.