Youth Futures Foundation

Youth Futures Foundation is the What Works Centre for youth employment.

It aims to narrow employment gaps for young people facing the greatest challenges by identifying what works and why and investing in evidence generation to improve policy and practice.

Some young people face more challenges than others:

• Care leavers are four times more likely to be NEET.
• In the year to June 2022, unemployment rates were highest for Black young people at 21%, compared to 9% for their White peers.
•  The proportion of NEET young people is highest amongst those from Pakistani or Bangladeshi backgrounds.

It’s bad for the economy too and must be addressed to meet our current economic inactivity challenge. Matching the NEET rates of Germany could add £38bn to our economy.

Youth Futures was founded in 2019 with funding from dormant assets to drive systemic change by:

• Awarding grants to organisations that provide employment support to young people so that we can generate high quality evaluations
• Generating compelling evidence through conducting and using experimental studies
• Driving evidence-based change in policy and working with employers and practitioners to improve practice. We help to connect and empower those who are commissioning and delivering youth employment support to change