Thoughts and Recommendations


"Our children and youth are our hope for tomorrow 

Providing recognized quality care is of utmost importance"
Jean Braun


We believe that the professionalism of Child and Youth Care work is integral to providing standardized, quality care for children and youth across Canada. These standards should be set by the professionals who work in the field, and the required education needs to reflect the importance of the work Child and Youth Care workers do. In order for these standards to be recognized by the general public, information about what we do and why it is important work needs to become general knowledge.


We also believe that the craft of professional Child and Youth Care is just that, a craft. In the same way that a highly skilled, professional surgeon is a craftsperson at her or his work, Child and Youth Care practitioners also need to be highly skilled, professional craftspersons.  

In Development of a Professional Identity for the Child Care Worker, Henry Maier says, "It is not a question of choice between two alternatives; rather it is a matter of identifying the point on the craft-professional continuum where one can presently locate child/youth care work. Law, medicine, nursing, and social work were once pure crafts with a heavy reliance upon apprentice/master learning systems and a pursuit of precise occupational techniques before they became acknowledged as professions. Child care is presently sliding or inching along this craft-professional continuum" (2001).

The word "professional" comes with a high level of status. Society sees doctors and lawyers as professionals because of the type of work they do and the sector they serve. Our children and youth are our hope for tomorrow; providing recognized quality care is of utmost importance. It shows a lack of insight to view those who work with children and youth as less than professional when they are providing support to our very future.





This website was created in 2011 by Jean Braun and Kristy Jackson
 students in the Child and Youth Care (CYC) stream of the Human Services Diploma program 
as a project for the "Professionalism in Child and Youth Care" course 
at Selkirk College in Castlegar, BC, Canada.