Active Games 4 Change - Implementing a Teaching Personal & Social Responsibility Intervention with Young Offenders in Europe

Social and emotional competencies (e.g. self-regulation, coping with challenges, positive relationships) are related to positive life outcomes. Justice-involved children and young people have not always had the opportunities to develop these competencies due to a range of disadvantages. This research explores the extent to which identified competencies can be developed within young people through specially designed active games utilising the Teaching Personal and Social Responsibility model. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected to assess the bespoke games’ effectiveness and tested in seven European countries (Italy, Spain, Portugal, Hungary, Romania, Turkey, UK). A total of 326 young people participated across 17 settings, with 105 educators trained in the methodology. The findings suggest that participation in the active games had a demonstrable impact, both overall and for the specific identified competencies. Participation in such programmes can support the holistic development of social and emotional competencies, which can facilitate readiness and openness to learning for other interventions. This key finding contributes to dis/engagement theory, recommending that such programmes should form the basis of a suite of interventions designed to support the educational (re)engagement and development of justice-involved children and young people. These findings have currency for developing practice and policies, which promotes positive outcomes on release back into the community across a range of national contexts.