Any experience with young offenders?

More specific questions would help. You mean getting into that area?

I worked in the sector but not directly with the young people but I know about support/mentor type work in the voluntary sector.

Your starting point needs to be experience working with young people in general, volunteering in a youth group setting is usually the easiest starting point. But you'll also want to see if there's any charities working in the area near you and get experience there, it'll be harder for you to get to work directly with the young people so anything that gets your foot in the door since even doing admin will help you learn.

You are then going to want to go into support work. For this you want a qualification in social care, it's not strictly required to get started but you'll struggle without it. Aim for a level 3 diploma at least. In the organisation I worked in a lot of the support staff had degrees (a few had masters), those who didn't were typically more middle aged and hence very experience having worked their way up from more basic support work. These are people in jobs around £24k and degrees were in things like psychology, youth work and social work.

It's a fairly specialised area so it might take you a few years to work your way into it.

Thank you for your reply - I'm currently on a speech and language therapy course but for various reasons I'm likely to leave after three years rather than the full four with a BSc in Speech Communication instead. I found a masters course in Criminology and Social Research Methods - do you think that would stand me in good stead? I was also looking at social work masters/post grad courses (apparently the diploma no longer exists) but thought maybe they would aim me down a slightly different track, or do you think they'd be ideal?

You're definitely right about volunteering being a good idea
- jobs in the sector all ask for experience with young people, so I'll look into local youth groups.
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It's kind of hard because there's no one way into it and if you really want to then you'll get there eventually regardless of degree. You're going to be a well educated candidate regardless so your main emphasis for development needs to be on the experience. You're right that local youth groups are the best way in but once you have a bit of experience then I'd recommend looking to work more specificity with those in difficult situations, preferably those highly linked to offending like homelessness and being in care.

The social research aspects of the degree isn't going to be relevant unless you want to eventually end up in a policy role. Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe criminology is quite quantitative where as social work is much more about the people. Most of the time employers won't be that excited by you knowing the stats, what they'll want is for you to understand the processes of the system and to be able to understand the emotional and psychological experiences of the individual.

Plus social work would presumably involve a placement? If you can get a criminal justice placement then that'd be very valuable. Social workers will always be a key factor in the lives of the young people when they are at the point of needing support and they will always be someone you'll be having contact with so knowing their role pretty inside out is valuable.

If you'd much prefer to do the criminology degree then do it, it's not going to hold you back especially if you can tailor your focus. It's by no means a deal breaker but I see social work as more relevant. But again, either way, you'll be well educated and your focus should be good experience.