Case Study
Feedback from the YMCA Youth Club's implementation
of the Goals Setting with your Buddy Programme

When Alan contacted us, out of the blue, suggesting that he had a life skills and coaching course for young people, we were not really sure what we were letting ourselves in for.

During the discussion we were interrupted by a 14 year old who had just been excluded from her art lessons for bad behaviour, it was one of her favourite subjects where she had high hopes of achieving a good GCSE.

Alan spontaneously slipped into 'coach' mode and encouraged her to find a strategy within herself to overcome this situation. It took two weeks but she successfully employed her strategy and returned to her art classes.

Witnessing this example was enough for us to realise we should give him, his life coaching ideas and strategies a trial. We had several meetings to create the format and style that would suit the young people and their environment. It was a trial that ran for 5 sessions.

We started with allowing them to create a dream of their goal and extend that, which enabled them to appreciate they could actually achieve more than they had originally thought. Another exercise enabled them to realise that they had already achieved things in their life successfully.

Other sessions included work that identified their own values and those of others around them, self-esteem and goal setting. The most exciting development sprung out of the group ethos - it was the Buddy System.

We did an exercise that identified how children learn and then we matched them up with a buddy with the same attributes. This was very interesting as it matched some unlikely candidates, it also had some very surprising results. For example a couple of children that would not normally talk to each other were deep in conversation and I heard one of them actually 'coaching' his colleague - it was fantastic. Also during other activities in the club the buddies were very protective of each other. The biggest benefit was that it carried outside the club and formed very solid companionships.

Overall we are very pleased with the results of this trial. I will definitely recommend we implement the course and would have no hesitation in recommending one of Alan's courses.

Gary Morley
Team Leader
Detached and Outreach Project
YMCA Youth Club
NB This review was based on the 5 session trial, the enhanced Buddy System course now runs to a minimum of 8 sessions.