Youth Investment Fund: Learning and Insight Paper Four
Home » Resource Hub »
This is the fourth in a series of learning and insight papers, published as part of the learning project for the Youth Investment Fund (YIF).
The Youth Investment Fund (YIF) is one of the biggest investments in open access youth provision in recent years. As such, it provides a unique learning opportunity to gain insights into a field that, in terms of impact, is currently under-researched and poorly understood.
From the beginning, the YIF learning project set out to test a new approach to evaluation in this context, in recognition of the profound limitations of traditional impact evaluation in informal and non-formal youth provision. As a result, this evaluation is truly pioneering and we have experienced the risks and rewards that go with such an approach.
In this report, we set out early findings about the quality and impact of open access youth provision, alongside insights into the development of feasible and meaningful evaluation approaches for this field.
This paper is for anyone working within, supporting or providing funding and resources for informal and non-formal learning provision for young people in the UK. The YIF only covers England, but we believe that the learning is relevant across the UK.
Download the full paper, and read our reflections on the key things we’re learning below:
You can also read Learning and Insight Paper One, a shared evaluation framework for open access youth provision, Learning and Insight Paper Two, background to the YIF economic simulation model, and Learning and Insight Paper Three, our shared outcomes measurement framework.
More from the Youth Investment Fund evaluation

Youth Investment Fund: Learning and Insight Paper One
This paper describes the shared evaluation framework that has been developed across the 90 YIF-funded organisations. It is aimed at anyone working within, supporting or providing funding and resources for informal and non-formal learning provision for young people in the UK.

Youth Investment Fund: Learning and Insight Paper Two
This is the second in a series of Learning and Insight papers published as part of the learning project for the Youth Investment Fund (YIF). This review aims to help inform the development of an economic simulation model for the YIF.

Youth Investment Fund: Learning and Insight Paper Three
This paper describes the YIF shared outcomes measurement framework that has been developed for the YIF-funded organisations, and set out the rationale behind the outcomes framework design.

Youth Investment Fund Learning and Impact Programme
Working with providers, funders, commissioners, policymakers and young people to improve the impact of services and youth work as part of a learning partnership for the Youth Investment Fund.