Youth Justice: On the ground

Mission: Using art to help prevent reoffending by changing attitudes

Funding: £8,900 from the arts development team at North East Lincolnshire Council and North East Lincolnshire Youth Offending Team

Young offenders in North East Lincolnshire have been turning their hands to art and DJing in an initiative aimed at preventing reoffending. The project has been running for more than four years and is a partnership between North East Lincolnshire Youth Offending Team (YOT) and the arts development team at North East Lincolnshire Council.

Young people aged up to 18 who have been referred to the project by the YOT work with either a visual artist or professional DJ to hone their skills and build their confidence. David Power, arts development officer at the council, says the young people are eager to engage with the chance to learn different skills.

"We will take it as far as we can," he says. "Some have gone on to paid work and others haven't reoffended. One lad went on to be a professional DJ but that's the icing on the cake, not the cake itself."

Power says the young people are initially more eager to take part in the DJing but soon turn their hands to visual arts too.

"When they see the art they think 'we do this at school' but they get engaged and sometimes you turn up to a session and there's young people so engrossed in what they're doing that it's like walking into a reference library," he says.

Last October the project scooped a regional prize in the Just Creativity Awards run by the Arts Council England, the Youth Justice Board and the youth offending teams in Yorkshire and the Humber.