Youth vocational assistance is provided in five forms, either independently or in combination with other services and financed by the Berlin district youth welfare offices after determining the individual need for assistance in advance:
Outpatient social work support and care
This flexibly manageable outpatient support programme is aimed at adolescents and young adults whose life situation at the transition from school to work is characterised by difficult family relationships and social disadvantages. They should be supported in social integration and in leading an independent lifestyle.
It is an assistance instrument that provides important support for young people and young adults both before the start of a semi-inpatient programme (e.g., vocational orientation or preparation) or after an intervention (e.g., after a social work supported training at the transition to starting work).
Social work supported vocational orientation
In the transition from school to work, there are also programmes that support young people through to their general school leaving certificate. Vocational orientation has two sides: young people ought to get to know their own interests, wishes and skills. On the other hand, they should know the requirements of the world of work so that they can orientate themselves to it.
Vocational orientation can be defined as the process of convergence and coordination between these two sides. In this lifelong process, the individual must repeatedly reflect on their subjective requirements and relate them to the objective requirements.
Vocational orientation programmes enable young people to master this process. For this reason, many stakeholders and institutions are involved in the process of vocational orientation: the young people themselves and their parents, schools, companies and associations, career counselling, specialists for skill assessment and individual support as well as institutions from the social environment, if necessary, and specialist departments that are involved in individual cases.
Social work supported vocational preparation including qualification
Vocational preparation aims to convey the prerequisites for acquiring vocational skills and thus to introduce vocational training in a recognised skilled occupation.
It makes it easier for young people, who in the conventional sense are not yet ready for training after leaving general education school, to enter a career by supporting a decision to choose a career that has not yet been made and creating the prerequisites for successfully starting vocational training. Vocational preparation measures are offered by youth welfare organisations, for example in the form of youth workshops or company integration projects.
In Berlin there are currently several company-integrated qualification projects that support young people in orienting themselves vocationally, looking for a training position, completing and successfully completing an apprenticeship and then finding a job. These qualification projects enable teaching and learning where company work actually takes place and where adolescents and young people can actually experience it.
Social work supported vocational training as an offering outside of or in cooperation with companies
Socially oriented vocational training combines elements of vocational education with elements of social work. This holistic approach incorporates into the support social learning processes as a useful and necessary supplement to vocational learning. The training is considered as part of personal development. Individual life history and needs are taken into account and feed into the training. A skills approach and practical learning are characteristics of socially oriented vocational training.
