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Using the voices of young people and their lived experiences, the Essex Youth Offending Service (YOS) has created four dramatic, impactful, animated films on County Lines to use when training professionals.

The Head of Essex Youth Offending Service, Tanya Gillett, identified there was a need for professionals across the county to gain more confidence when working with young people who’d been involved with county lines.

One way to give them that knowledge and confidence was to capture the lived experiences of the young people they were working with and thus communicate their experiences to professionals so they could see the issues and dangers the young people were faced with.

Understanding the experiences of young people, means those working with them will have a better insight of the journey of the young person which they could then use to start conversations and improve their understanding of how to support and help them.

Using the direct words and experiences of the young people, their experiences have been captured through four short animated films covering: Exploitation; Bereavement; Motivation and Breaking the Cycle.

Produced in collaboration with the Youth Justice Board’s County Lines Pathfinder Project and Essex VVU, the films are currently being used in training workshops across Essex with the aim of giving professionals – social workers, probation officers, youth workers, police, teachers etc – the tools and confidence to be professionally curious, to ask questions of the young people they are working with and build their professional knowledge by understanding the drivers, behaviours and contributing factors to how a young person may act.

You can view the background behind the films at https://vimeo.com/554845427/430869068c

As explained in this film, this is about building confident and resilient professionals, and a workforce that can adapt to a changing landscape and changing scenarios.

The four short animated films, as part of training workshops, give professionals the knowledge and insight to support their practice and through this the young people and families they are working with.