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Youth Engagement: 7 Best Practices

  • Writer: Marine Ronzi
    Marine Ronzi
  • Aug 18
  • 7 min read

Updated: Oct 24

Are youth still engaging — and if so, how?


Youth engagement is a key indicator of the vitality of any humanitarian organisation. With around 17 million volunteers, the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement offers an exceptional lens into how young people across the world are redefining volunteering, often on their own terms.


Whether in global spaces or local programmes, youth are no longer passive recipients of programming. They are actively shaping their own forms of engagement, often independently from traditional structures. In today’s world of climate instability, social fragmentation, and digital disruption, organisations must adapt their models to stay relevant.


Youth volunteering is evolving, and organisations everywhere are adapting. This story offers a grounded case study of how youth engagement strategies can be reimagined to meet today’s realities.


Youth Volunteering Around the World


Patterns of youth volunteering differ widely across regions and are shaped by social, economic, and institutional factors.


  • In Western Europe, rigid organisational formats and demographic ageing have made youth recruitment more difficult (Eurobarometer, 2019).

  • In parts of Asia, volunteering is often integrated into national education systems, supporting higher participation rates among young people.

  • And in contexts where economic pressure is high, volunteering may be linked to livelihood strategies, with many youth expecting clear personal or professional development outcomes in exchange for their time (ILO, 2019).


Globally, the 2022 State of the World’s Volunteerism Report (UNV SWVR 2022) highlights that over 58% of volunteering takes place informally, meaning often outside the structure of formal organisations, and that youth are particularly active in these forms.


Understanding this diversity is essential to building systems that are inclusive and equitable.


Pandemic Lessons and Digital Innovation


At the Monaco Red Cross, the COVID-19 pandemic transformed how we worked with young people. Our youth volunteers helped design and implement rapid interventions: home tutoring during school closures, contactless deliveries to isolated individuals, and virtual check-ins like digital tea parties that maintained the bonds of our intergenerational network.


Monaco, 2020. Youth-led work didn't stop during the Pandemic. But it took us some time to adapt.
Monaco, 2020. Youth-led work didn't stop during the Pandemic. But it took us some time to adapt.

Digital engagement became an essential part of our operating model. It opened up new forms of participation and enabled continuity during an uncertain time. Many of these approaches remain active today, reflecting how resilience, creativity, and proximity can coexist online. These formats represent durable evolutions in how young people contribute.


What Youth Want: From Roles to Purpose


Insights from Feedback from the Network and Is the Era of Volunteer Retention Over? from the IFRC highlight a clear message: today’s youth seek meaningful engagement over static roles. Their commitment is not to institutions, but to causes. They want to shape, not just support.


This is also the shift we embraced at the Monaco Red Cross. I joined the organisation at 24 as its Youth Focal Point, and in 2015, I became its Youth and Volunteering Coordinator. This new position signalled a structural shift. For the first time in decades, we created a dedicated Youth Department with a mandate to work across all areas: emergency response, education, protection, health, and community mobilisation.


Climate is among youth top priorities. Equipping them with the right methodology and tracking down local action will lead to tangible results on a larger scale.
Climate is among youth top priorities. Equipping them with the right methodology and tracking down local action will lead to tangible results on a larger scale.

We co-developed a Youth Engagement Strategy rooted in participation, inclusion, and local relevance. The goal was to move beyond participation, creating space for young people to lead, initiate, and shape the future of volunteering in ways relevant to their realities.


The impact was tangible. Youth activities multiplied and diversified, from school-based initiatives to international exchanges. We partnered with Monaco’s Ministry of Education to embed Red Cross values, first aid, and civic skills into public schools. Volunteers became facilitators, designers, and advocates.


We structured our strategy around four key commitments:

  • By youth – young people co-created and led projects across our community.

  • For youth – addressing vulnerabilities with programmes in schools and neighbourhoods.

  • As youth changemakers – using tools like YABC, Y-Adapt, and partnerships with the education system.

  • With youth in the decision-making process – formal youth representation on the Governing Board.


This approach fostered real ownership. Young people took the lead on strategy, training, and outreach. They were no longer just involved, they were in charge of shaping the future of the organisation.


Youth Engagement Strategy as a game changer at Monaco Red Cross
Youth Engagement Strategy as a game changer at Monaco Red Cross

The Rise of New Volunteering


Across the globe, new forms of volunteering are emerging — more flexible, decentralised, and focused on purpose. Micro-volunteering, remote formats, skill-based action, and rapid-response contributions are no longer exceptions. They’re becoming the norm.


A clear example of this shift is the Limitless Youth Innovation Academy - Climate & Environment Edition, launched by the IFRC Solferino Academy. I was part of the core team for this programme, which engaged thousands of young people from more than 140 countries, resulting in 2.2M beneficiaries around the world. My role included programme design, from risk assessment to reporting, coordinating communications, training mentors in multiple communities and supervising communities to help youth design responses to climate and environmental challenges, from ideation to prototyping, deployment and scaling. I have also coordinated safeguarding processes throughout the whole programme.


Driving communities of Youth Innovation Mentors has been one of the most exciting recent experiences I've taken part recently.
Driving communities of Youth Innovation Mentors has been one of the most exciting recent experiences I've taken part recently.

But Limitless went far beyond programme design. It challenged core assumptions about how volunteering systems operate. By removing institutional and administrative barriers, the programme gave young people the autonomy to act while staying aligned with their National Society’s mandate. Training was delivered online, directly accessible from a phone. Funding was sent to personal bank accounts or mobile wallets, with fewer delays or complex paperworks.


This structure reduced friction and empowered youth to move fast from ideation to implementation in a matter of weeks. Instead of being slowed down by formal procedures, they could test, adapt, and improve in real time. And far from operating in isolation, the results of their work fed directly back into their communities and National Societies. Prototypes developed independently became new tools, services, or ways of working that their organisations could learn from, adopt and scale.


When embraced by a Red Cross or a Red Crescent National Society, Limitless offered a new blueprint for how we can decentralise trust, cut red tape, and create real space for action based on trust, while maintaining strategic alignment and accountability.


Seven Ways to Support Youth-Led Volunteering


So how can organisations improve youth engagement? How do we move from participation to shared ownership? Whether you're designing a new strategy, rethinking governance, or trying to better connect with young people in your context, these recommendations offer practical entry points. These insights are drawn from over a decade of experience in programmes at national and global levels.


  1. Diversify how people can get involved

    Volunteering must adapt to different life contexts. This means offering flexible formats: from short-term, one-off actions to long-term commitments; from in-person roles to digital opportunities; from operational support to strategic input. At the Monaco Red Cross, we mapped accessibility barriers and created multiple entry points, which led to broader, more inclusive participation across age, gender, and availability.

  2. Build with, not for

    Programmes that resonate are designed in collaboration with young people, and not imposed from the top. This co-creation process builds trust, strengthens ownership, and ensures that initiatives reflect the priorities and realities of youth. It’s also where innovation often begins. In our youth strategy, every major initiative was prototyped with volunteers, not just for them.

  3. Invest in meaningful digital spaces

    Digital is a vital space for connection, recognition, and inclusion. From training and mentoring to storytelling and peer support, online engagement expands reach and lowers barriers. During the pandemic, our online events and virtual trainings and workshops helped volunteers maintain community and purpose. Today, many continue to prefer hybrid formats that let them balance commitment and flexibility.

  4. Invite youth into decision-making

    Symbolic inclusion isn’t enough. Youth should have real influence in governance, programme design, and funding decisions. We institutionalised this at the Monaco Red Cross through a formal youth seat on the Governing Board, backed by a clear mandate and regular reporting. This presence reshaped how the organisation considered its future.

  5. Recognise impact, not longevity

    Traditional models often reward time served. But for youth, what matters is what changes in communities, in lives, in systems. We shifted our recognition culture to value creativity, courage, and outcomes. Whether someone contributed for one week or one year, what they achieved was what counted.

  6. Make mentorship go both ways

    Mentoring is most powerful when it’s mutual. Intergenerational learning should be a two-way process, with space for youth to teach as well as learn. In our projects, we facilitated reverse mentoring between young volunteers and senior staff and volunteers, creating powerful shifts in attitudes and capabilities on both sides.

  7. Track what matters

    Metrics shape behaviour. That’s why we moved beyond counting hours and sign-up sheets. We tracked belonging, leadership development, and local impact, and used these indicators to refine our approach. Data doesn’t have to be cold; when used ethically, it reflects stories and strengthens strategies.


Today, I help institutions turn these principles into reality through strategic advising, facilitation, and co-design of youth-led systems.


Listening to the Present


Low engagement is rarely a sign of disinterest. More often, it reflects organisational systems misaligned with youth expectations and lived realities. From Monaco to the Limitless Youth Innovation Academy, I’ve seen how transformation happens when we step back, listen, and co-create.


Volunteering doesn’t need to be redesigned from scratch. But it must be reimagined with those who will carry it forward.

To remain relevant, volunteering systems must engage with the present realities of youth, grounded in their lived experience.


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