Building Your Professional Portfolio: A Guide for Youth Worker Apprentices

Your professional portfolio is an important part of your Level 6 Youth Worker Degree Apprenticeship.

It provides evidence of how you've developed the knowledge, skills and behaviours required of a professional youth worker.

Your portfolio should be something you build throughout your apprenticeship, rather than something you create at the end.

What can your portfolio demonstrate?

Your evidence should show how you've developed and applied your learning in your workplace.

Evidence could include:

• Workplace documents and records
• Witness testimonies
• Observations of your practice
• Reflective accounts
• Annotated photographs, where appropriate and with the correct consent or redaction
• Short video clips where permitted
• Project evidence
• Work-based learning
• Relevant professional documentation

Your evidence may demonstrate more than one apprenticeship standard, so focus on the quality and relevance of your evidence, rather than simply collecting large amounts of material.

Think about the KSBs

Your apprenticeship standard contains the knowledge, skills and behaviours you need to demonstrate.

Use National Youth Agency – Standards and Resources to support your understanding of professional youth work standards and development.

When you complete an activity, ask yourself:

Which knowledge, skill or behaviour does this demonstrate?

What did I actually do?

What was the outcome?

What did I learn?

What evidence can demonstrate this?

Protect confidentiality

Youth work involves sensitive information.

Never include identifiable information about young people, families, colleagues or other individuals unless you have the appropriate permission and it is genuinely necessary.

Where appropriate, anonymise or redact information.

Always follow your employer's policies, safeguarding procedures and data protection requirements.

Don't leave portfolio building until the end

Portfolio building should become part of your normal apprenticeship routine.

After completing a significant piece of work, supporting a project or handling a challenging situation, consider whether it could provide useful evidence.

Your Professional Learning Mentor can help you understand what evidence is suitable and how it can demonstrate the apprenticeship standards.

Your portfolio and End-point Assessment

Your portfolio is particularly important when preparing for End-point Assessment (EPA).

For the professional discussion, your portfolio can provide evidence to support your preparation and help you demonstrate the knowledge, skills and behaviours you've developed.

The portfolio itself is not directly graded, but it can support your answers during the discussion.

Build it carefully. Keep it organised. Know your evidence.

By the time you reach EPA, your portfolio should demonstrate your development throughout your apprenticeship and your progress towards becoming a professional youth worker.