The government has been funding Integrated Children and Youth Services Centres (ICYSCs) since 1994. With 139 centers across all districts, ICYSCs adopt a whole-person and community-based approach to meet the developmental needs of children and youth from ages 6-24, providing different forms of professional support, guidance, and community participation.
Over the past 30 years, ICYSCs have supported the countless youth on their positive development, many becoming active leaders and contributing to society. However, with the rapid changes in society and technology across the 21st century, along with the growing complexity of family structures and youth needs, the youth service sector must strive for innovation. How to further develop a professional practice framework, design attractive services that allow youth to actively engage in their neighbourhood, and help youth develop meaningful relationships in the community, are some of the many echoing themes surrounding the discourse on service innovation.
Therein lies the importance of 21C@JC, as “youth-centricity” is one of the core concepts of the project. We hope to facilitate the sector's transformation towards providing more user-centric services, setting up systematic youth participation mechanisms, as well as making data-informed service evaluations and building cross-sector resource networks to support youth into further becoming active contributors.
Guided by the principles of Youth-Adult Partnership (“YAP”), 21C@JC hopes to transform the youth service sector into truly becoming “by youth”, “with youth”, and “for youth”. Not only raising their ownership and sense of belonging towards the centre, but also leading the way for ICYSCs to continually improve their services with the changing times.
