About PARS

PARS is a model of professional playwork practice, a programme of introductory and accredited courses for adults who work with children in their leisure time and an international community of
like-minded practitioners and academics.

Our Vision

PARS practitioners all over the world share a vision of a world where childhood is valued as a distinctly different stage of life from adulthood.
Children are naturally curious, creative, spontaneous, experimental and live in the ‘here and now’. These characteristics of childhood are hugely important for children’s happiness and well-being (now and in the future).
PARS practitioners advocate for recognition by the adult world that children need time and space to be children and that childhood is an equally important stage of life to adulthood.

Our Mission and Purpose

PARS playwork practice empowers adults to let children be children and empowers children to enjoy their leisure time from their own perspectives.

Our mission is to create a worldwide community of professional PARS playwork practitioners. We are achieving this by qualifying adults who provide supervised leisure time for children in PARS playwork practice.

PARS practitioners free up time and space for children to be children by enabling children to direct their own free time, despite the presence of adults.

         Our Values

Our international PARS community of practitioners, academics, assessors and administration  team all have the PARS vision, mission and purpose in common and also share several fundamental values. These values underpin all our work – whether that’s working directly with children, in our training delivery and research, and even in our meetings (there’s no such thing as a ‘boring meeting’ in PARS!).

Above all, PARS people always find joy in what we do – even the tricky bits! – as we can see children’s experiences of their leisure time changing around the world as a result of our work. And of course, being supported by such a dynamic international community of like-minded people is a real joy in itself! If you share our vision of a world where childhood is treated as a different but equal part of the human life span and would like to connect with like-minded adults around the world, do......

Our PARS playwork community is a fun, stimulating and supportive space to explore the needs of children and childhood from different perspectives. In the spirit of curiosity and adventure, we constantly develop new partnerships and projects, finding innovative solutions to old playwork problems. We are happy when we are can learn from our mistakes and we respect and support others when they do the same. We never position ourselves as ‘experts’, as we are all learning about children, childhood and how to work in different contexts all the time. We value other approaches to working with children and love to learn from and with professionals from diverse disciplines.

 Reflexion, empathy, authenticity, curiosity, collaboration, integrity, flexibility, creativity, innovation, transformation, respect, joy.

PARS Licensed Trainers

PARS Trainees Worldwide

Different Countries