When we open a newspaper or turn on the TV, all too often there’s a story of a child who’s been the victim of a fatal stabbing or a violent assault. All around our country, there are children living in fear. And it can be because of that fear that some children end up carrying knives. This cycle has to stop. 

At the Youth Endowment Fund (YEF), our mission is to stop violence before it happens. The way we do it is by finding out what works to prevent children from becoming involved. And we’re building a movement to put that knowledge into practice.  

The YEF Toolkit is one way we’ll make sure that the best available research on preventing violence is translated into change for the children affected.   

We know that there are people all around the country working to make sure that the right services are in place to protect children from harm. There are projects up and running in schools, mental health, and youth centres, for families. So many people, including social workers, teachers, police officers, youth workers, parents and residents, are all taking part, helping to keep children safe. 

The YEF Toolkit is here to help everyone working towards this goal.

Before the YEF Toolkit, evidence about how best to support children was often: 

• Hard to find, across lots of different (and often complicated) websites 
• Hard to access, hidden behind journal paywalls 
• Hard to understand, written in a complicated academic language without consideration of what the findings mean for decisions in the real world.  

That made it hard to use the right evidence to make sure children get the evidence-led services they deserve.  

The YEF Toolkit is different. It’s a free, online summary of the best available research on preventing violence. 

If you’re a commissioner, a youth charity leader, a manager of children’s services, a headteacher, a police officer or a practitioner, it’s for you. It’s here to help you find the right solutions to prevent violence in your community. 

If you have a problem in your school, you can see how a social skills programme might help. If you work for a Police and Crime Commissioner, you could discover how partnership approaches like focused deterrence could make a difference.  If you’re a Youth Offending Team manager, you can find out how to improve a pre-court diversion, giving you the best chance at reducing reoffending. The YEF Toolkit is here to support your decision-making. To work best, it needs to be used alongside the expertise you have about what the children in your local area need.

The YEF Toolkit is a live resource. We’re working closely with organisations at all levels to make sure it gives the information you need in a way that’s easy to find. Over time, we’ve been listening to your feedback and used it to help us decide which areas of research we should summarise next. Through our grants, we’re also working to rapidly improve the evidence base in England and Wales, by evaluating the promising programmes we fund. And as we work to build the evidence, we’ll keep sharing it through the YEF Toolkit. 

By working together to grow and share the evidence, we can make sure children get the evidence-informed services they deserve.  

Find out more about the YEF Toolkit (and how to use it) here.