Parenting programs can improve parenting and improve children's behaviour and performance in school. Preventing school failure . Students who fail in school, behave disruptively, truant or are excluded are more likely to offend than those who achieve in school. Quality pre school education, family literacy projects, mentoring and supported learning programs, measures to return excluded students to mainstream education and a more flexible curriculum that includes vocational training and work experience are amongst the approaches that can reduce school failure. Refocussing youth work .
Youth work has an important role to play in reducing delinquent lifestyles amongst the young.
After school, weekend and holiday activity projects can prevent anti-social behaviour and minor crime. Outreach youth work and more focussed preventive projects have been shown to work with those who offend more frequently. Consideration should be given to concentrating youth work resources in priority areas, targeting hard to reach young people and making prevention a key objective. There is much to be gained by recruiting local young people as youth workers. Preparing young people for work.