Work with Us

Find out about current opportunities with the Museum of Youth Culture.

Youth Work Lead - Creative & Heritage

Hours: Full-time (40 hours per week)
Salary: £35,000
Contract: 1 Year Contract (rolling)
Location: Vauxhall, London
Closing Date: Monday April 1st, 11.30pm

The Museum of Youth Culture is an emerging museum celebrating the lives of teenagers and young people over the last century. We work to preserve youth culture, subculture & counterculture history to inspire future generations of young people. In order to ensure that we capture experiences of growing up from across the UK’s regions and build a truly national Museum of Youth Culture, we have developed a radical outreach programme, taking a grassroots and community-led approach to collecting and storytelling. 

Championing the impact of young people on modern society, our learning programme works to place young people past, present and future as key to the arts, culture and heritage sector. Central to the Museum’s mission is to champion contemporary youth voice and inspire young people through creative workshops, heritage training and youth culture history. 

We are looking for an experienced youth worker to join our team and work with us to further develop and grow our youth programme to the next level. You will work collaboratively with the museum’s team and archives to build a youth programme suited to the needs of young people today, applying youth culture history as a tool to create a relatable and creative safe space for young people. 

Whilst you will be working on our youth programme across the board, your work will have a focus on developing programmes working with girls and young women in London.

We are at an exciting stage in the development of the museum and this is a brilliant opportunity for someone who is keen to help shape a youth programme and help us champion the importance of youth culture history. 

This position has been funded with generous support from the City Bridge Foundation.

About the Role:

  • Work with the Archive Projects Manager to develop a menu of creative and youth culture heritage focused workshops and deliver these with youth groups, schools and other partners.
  • Develop, facilitate and deliver a regular in-house youth programme at the museum aimed at supporting young people to break into the heritage and creative industries, as well as wider personal and professional development. 
  • Supporting the museum’s Radical Youth Leaders programme and helping the museum build a louder youth voice within our curation and programming strategy. 
  • Reaching out and developing new partnerships with youth and community organisations across London, whilst nurturing already existing partnerships.

Previous experience:

  • At least 3 years experience working with young people in an education or community setting, including the delivery of workshops to groups of young people. Recent experience of working face to face with young women and girls. 
  • Understanding the experiences and context of young people’s lives in London today, with an understanding of the challenges young people face.
  • Experience and belief in the power of creativity to support and amplify young people, and in running creative-led workshops for young people.  
  • Experience managing youth projects, including overseeing and managing other people. 
  • Experience of partnership working and of maintaining excellent working relationships with a range of stakeholders.

Who are you:

  • A passion and understanding of youth culture heritage, and excitement to be part of the world’s first museum dedicated to the history of young people. 
  • Excellent interpersonal skills with the ability to build trusted relationships with a wide range of young people of all ages and backgrounds.
  • Ability to generate new ideas for workshop activities and curriculum. 
  • A positive and hands on approach to your youth work that centres creativity and participation. 
  • Ability to relate to, encourage and motivate young people to form positive relationships.
  • Ability to work independently and on own initiative, as well as in a team.
  • Happy to support on other projects, events and opportunities when they arise, and have a flexible approach to your work.
  • Have strong commitment to the celebration and amplification of young people and their voices across the arts, heritage and cultural sector.

Useful if you have:

  • Hold or working towards a relevant Youth Work Qualification.
  • Experience working with public history, including oral history and community history
  • An understanding of criminal exploitation within young people, and experience navigating these complex challenges.

Details:

  • Full-time role, 40 hours per week
  • Based from our archive space in Vauxhall, but working across the city 
  • Some evening and weekend work will be required
  • Salary: £35,000
  • 1 Year Contract (rolling)

The museum has robust safeguarding policies and you will have an Enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) Check if successful with your application.

How to Apply:

To apply for this role, please send your CV and a cover letter outlining relevant experience and why you’d like to join the Museum of Youth Culture to info@museumofyouthculture.com with the subject line Senior Youth Worker - Creative & Heritage.

The closing date for this role is Monday April 1st, 11.30pm

Initial interviews will take place around mid-April. 

Museum of Youth Culture is an equal opportunities employer, and we encourage applications from people of all backgrounds, identities, and ages. We particularly welcome applications from marginalised groups, such as people of colour and other ethnic minorities, people who identify as LGBTQIA, disabled people and those from working class backgrounds.

About the Museum:

The Museum of Youth Culture is an emerging museum dedicated to the styles, sounds and social movements innovated by young people over the last 100 years. Championing the impact of youth on modern society, the Museum of Youth Culture’s collection incorporates photographs, ephemera, objects and oral histories celebrating our shared youth culture history. From the bomb-site Bicycle racers in post-war 1940s London, to the Acid House ravers of 1980s Northern England, the Museum of Youth Culture empowers the extraordinary everyday stories of growing up in Britain.

We have all been young once, but how do we perceive the generations of young people that come after us? Much of society’s discourse around teenagers has been shaped by media representations and as a result, according to a 2011 study by the Intergenerational Foundation, British people have the most negative perception of their youth compared to other European nations. Maybe this is why we are the first to open a museum dedicated to young people.

The Museum of Youth Culture aims to challenge the negative perceptions and step beyond the headlines, considering that whilst a lot has changed over the generations, we all experience the formative highs and lows of adolescence as we take our first steps towards adulthood. Young people have always been at the forefront of change, whether societal, cultural or technological, and it’s time that we champion this incredible history and inspire the next generation to continue to break the mould.