Problem addressed

In recent years in Czechia there has been a general decline in young people attending youth clubs and using youth counselling services as they spend more of their free time on social media. This creates a barrier for social and youth workers to reach and support vulnerable young people. Diakonie Zapad, a non-governmental social service provider, observed that the number of at-risk children and young people receiving their services fell from 724 to 529 between 2017 and 2019. In response, a few initiatives offering online counselling in Czechia have been developed, but they all require people to reach out to the service themselves by sending an email or entering a chat room or virtual club. This begins with the assumption that people are aware that they need support, know where to ask for it and do so – which is often not the case, particularly for vulnerable groups.

Innovative solution

Streetwork in Chat adapts youth work to the online social media environment whilst maintaining the proactive outreach approach of physical youth work. Its aim is to identify and reach more, and more vulnerable, young people than online counselling services which place the onus on the individual to get the help they need. Streetwork in Chat targets young people up to 26 years old living in both urban and rural areas across Czechia.

The project is run by Diakonie Zapad. Social workers from Diakonie Zapad use their professional accounts on Facebook to implement Streetwork in Chat, which involves three different types of intervention. The first type is information-sharing and awareness raising. Through public posts, the social workers clarify misconceptions that are common among young people with risky behaviours, relating to hate comments or self-harm and suicide declarations. The second type is to join specific chat groups and start conversations with young people, comment on the posts of group members, mediate conversations and provide reflections on hate comments. Social workers usually intervene on topics such as financial literacy, crime prevention, addiction, gambling, self-harm, bullying, personal security, education, employment and self-perception. To identify young people in need on social media, social workers look for group titles that include words such as ‘confession’ or ‘support’. By publicly commenting on posts, social workers hope to encourage reflection and a supportive attitude among other group members. The third type of intervention involves direct outreach. The streetworker connects with the person involved in the post directly through a chat to understand how serious the problem is, assess the situation and connect the person with social workers or psychologists in the local area, if needed.

Streetwork in Chat has built partnerships with organisations and associations that are active on these topics and able to provide face-to-face support, if needed. The online counselling deals with a range of challenging situations. Depending on the young person’s specific needs, the interventions made in a private chat can last for a few minutes or a few weeks. For example, a 14-year-old pregnant girl approached one of the social workers through Facebook chat, asking for help. After weeks of online counselling, the young girl decided to talk to her parents and seek medical assistance.

Key results and benefits

Compared to the classic street social work approach, online counselling can reach a wider audience, including young people who live in remote areas. Over the last two years, social workers intervened online more than 900 times through individual chats, public posts and comments. Young people who were directly involved in the three types of interventions provided positive feedback through Facebook chat. The public posts, Facebook polls and comments of social workers can reach unlimited numbers of people, thus generating further impact.

Streetwork in Chat creates new opportunities for social workers themselves. Diakonie Zapad employs three professional social workers to fill these posts, who benefit from flexible working hours. This is welcome, especially for employees seeking more flexibility as they have the option to work online from home.

Potential for mainstreaming

The Streetwork in Chat project has been financially supported by various foundations, namely Nadace rozvoje občanské společnosti, Nadace Komerční banky, a.s. – Jistota, Nadace Agrofert and Nadace CSOB – Digital Safety. It costs around EUR 3 900 per year to run, with social workers undertaking additional voluntary work. More funding is needed to expand the team of social workers, reach out to more young people and scale-up individualised support.

To increase the chances of receiving government funding and mainstream the project, the team is lobbying for an adjustment of the law so that online social counselling is incorporated into normal social service regulations. The legal framework is ready to be reviewed by the Czech Government. Social workers from Streetwork in Chat have participated in working group discussions and contributed to the media coverage on this topic. A condition for successful transfer and mainstreaming to another context is having a supportive legal framework for online social service provision.

On the technical side, one of the challenges faced by the social workers relates to the fact that Facebook only allows users to send a limited number of friend requests per day. Streetwork in Chat therefore aims to build partnerships with social media platforms to overcome this and bring more recognition and credibility to the professional online counselling it provides. To adapt to the ever-changing digital environment and preferences of the target audience, social workers are developing a new strategy to deliver services through Instagram. Capacity to develop such partnerships is another condition for successful transfer of Streetwork in Chat to other contexts.

The project received the Sozial Marie Prize in 2019, which recognises socially innovative solutions across Europe.