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Youth Club: What are Legal Child to Adult Ratios?

By: Maggie Lonsdale BA (hons) - Updated: 13 Jan 2020 | comments*Discuss
 
Youth Adult Child Community Ratios

Q.

We are trying to set a youth club in our village. We need some advice however, on what the ratio is for the number of children per adult. We will have two groups one will be 8 -11 year olds and the other will be 12-16 year olds.

(E.C, 19 May 2009)

A.

Hello and thank you for your question.

The rules and regulations surrounding 'village hall' type events are, sadly, getting more and more involved, such an insurance and legal issues. It can be rather tricky to simply hold a jumble sale now and if you're thinking of an event involving alcohol, you can practically forget it.

Some local council, parishes or community organisers are more realistic than others, though, even though they must all abide by the rules, so if the person or committee that is in charge of your village hall is easy to approach and relatively flexible, you may be more successful.

These people are also good to have on your side in terms of helping you get funding - many local councils have community funding available for youth groups but it can be hard to make sure your group is on the list when the cheques get handed out.

In answer to your question about child to adult ratios, the official current government figures only actually go up to 12 years old, with numbers staying the same for ages up to 16.

It is actually your 'eight year old' cut off point that is more relevant, as for children aged eight, you need to have one adult for every ten children, up to 20 children; one adult for every eleven children, up to 22 children and one adult for every twelve children up to 24 children.

For children aged nine to twelve, the figures are slightly different. Here, you will require one adult for every twelve children for groups up to 24 and one adult for every fourteen children for groups up to 28. It is worth pointing out that, where you have groups of mixed ages, you must have the right level of supervision based on the average age of the majority of the group.

Now, who are these supervisors? This is another difficult area, because unless the adults are the parents or legal guardians of at least one of the children involved, they need to have suitable supervisory qualifications. There also needs to be enough supervisors to cover necessary breaks or for the adults to deal with an emergency.

The best advice is to have plenty of supervisors. Make it into a community event where people can meet while still allowing the young people of your community a little freedom. A good place to find further advice is your local council office as they can at least signpost you to a suitable community advisor.

Good luck!

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Our Response:
If the children will be with you all day it will simplify your planning if you ask the parents to provide a packed lunch for each child. You will then just need to provide morning and afternoon snacks, and drinks. However, you should register with your local authority as a 'food business' if you serve any kind of food in your setting. Although you are not planning on running a holiday club, some of the fundamental details can be found via the Out of School Alliance link here which will allow you to cherry-pick the relevant advice to you and also provides details on insurances and food provision laws. I hope this helps.
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