We are writing to you from ‘Team Young People’, a group of young individuals supported through the work of InspireChilli. A number of us in the Team have turned or are turning 26, inspiring us to question what it means to suddenly find yourself ‘counted out’ of the normal age range for being valued as a young person. We would like to draw your attention to the experiences of those aged out of youth opportunities, and ask for your time to consider whether this could be changed in the future.
We recognise that reaching 26 brings a different stage of being – an evolution in how we think and experience ourselves physically and emotionally as individuals. But the change has far more significance externally in terms of what being 26+ means you are supposed to have done and what you can’t do anymore, than how you actually feel as a person and what you would still like to do with your life. This seems particularly true for how funders and youth charities appear to view those aged over 25.
We think that, post 25, you should feel able to put off some of the greater responsibilities of adulthood until you have found yourself. It is certainly true that, aged over 25, something shifts that means you are no longer just a young person; but neither are you a fully formed independent adult. There still seems a need for opportunities to fit this ‘in between’ stage of emerging adulthood to help people complete a healthy transition. Instead of being able to find and create these opportunities, our experience is that young adults end up excluded from the things they recognise as increasingly useful.
What this means is that, as you approach 25 and beyond, you feel an enhanced pressure to ‘get your life together’. This leads to a sense of anxiety and failure that you have somehow messed up by 26 if you haven’t nailed a series of almost impossible expectations. It’s an unfair cut off age because young people might miss some of their growing up time looking after others and dealing with disadvantages rather than having the luxury to embrace wider opportunities. True in our case. Then, when you reach the point you can do things, you find out that any years you have lost are not accounted for – you are all judged to have aged out of youth at the same fixed point, regardless of what stage you have reached in your life course. Even worse, the markers being used to judge that ageing point at 26 no longer even reflect the experiences of those in transition to adulthood – for whom the traditional markers of having a home, having a job and secure income, are all more uncertain. Never more so than now.
According to current data from the national office of statistics, the transition to employment occurs at a later age than ever before, with only 50% of young people starting a full time work experience by the age of 19. Young people are also living with their parents longer, with 10% more 26 year olds in 2017 than in 1997. Only by the age of 30 do the figures between 1997 and 2017 level out, suggesting that the transition beyond the family home takes 5 years longer than before. It is not until 34 that 50% of young adults are able to own their own home. Instead, the majority of 25-34 year olds rent, 20% more than in 1998.
Nearly half of young people want to be able to support themselves financially by the time they reach the age of 23, with two fifths hoping to be earning up to £30,000 a year by the time they're 25. But, according to an article by Sophie Christie in the Telegraph (March 5, 2015) ‘with rising house prices, high university fees and falling savings rates, "Generation Y" is finding this goal out of their reach’. Similarly, Kate Hughes reports in the Independent (Oct 8, 2018) that ‘half of 25- to 34-year-olds simply aren’t financially robust’ while a third are also reported to not feel emotionally resilient enough to cope. We share these views.
Why then, we ask, would any funder or youth organisation draw the line at 25? We wonder if you, our reader, are aware of how this limitation impacts on those over that age, who feel a failure not to have achieved the goals we might experience through the impacts your particular opportunities and funded programmes promote? The life of being a young adult has changed. Your funding and investment parameters have not ‘grown up’ to keep in sync with us. At 26, you might need opportunities to complete your transition into a thriving adulthood; you might still be overcoming gaps left from previous experiences of disadvantage; but, according to most funders and youth charities, you simply no longer count. The door is closed on you.
We’d like to hold you accountable for why your programmes for young people choose to exclude those over 25. Not by criticising what you do fund and provide, but by inviting you to reflect on the logic of that age definition, its appropriateness to the experiences of young adults today (even more so post covid-19), and its negative impact on the levels of anxiety and exclusion increasingly experienced by our generation.
We’d also like to share with you how crazy it is for us to even be worried about being too old when we’re all still under 30! However, that is the logical conclusion of putting age-based restrictions onto programmes. Looking in from outside, we are influenced to see ourselves as too old – and feel we have failed because we still have things we want to achieve. Even at 26 we have potential ahead of us, don’t you agree? We are still ‘opportunity youth’ evolving into adult identities, seeking to take control of our lives and do meaningful things with and for others.
One meaningful thing we would like to do is share 4 future options for you to consider:
- Could you recognise that the age of 26-30 is a more accurate phase for ‘emerging adulthood’ than 21-25, given the statistical evidence on changes in behaviours, beliefs and access to resources, and thus consider supporting specific opportunities for this age range in your future portfolio for investment?
- Could you consider changing the use of strict age boundaries for programmes and at the very least allow up to 30 years of age as a cut-off point to allow the possibility to include people who might merit funding over 25?
- Could you offer a special ‘pass’ for those over 25 who still have relevant opportunity needs due to lived experiences that may have prevented their access to these opportunities at a younger age?
- Could you just avoid age specific markers altogether, and instead make funding and programme opportunities more theme or life-stage specific, able to consider personal needs outside of limited fixed ages? This would be our most preferred option.
We would love to hear back from you and invite you to share your views on:
i) Why you currently restrict funding and opportunities at 25 in your definition of young adulthood
ii) Whether any of our options might be practical for you to implement
iii) If you would be up for working with us to find ways to count more young people in rather than counting all young people out after 25
We appreciate that we have limited power to change how the youth sector works, but we offer our thoughts and passion in the hope we can inspire you to take action with us on this cause.
With greatest respect and thanks for all that you do to benefit young people -
Team Young People
