Dr Sarah Brooks-Wilson

Department of Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology
Lecturer in Criminology
Dissertation Convenor

Contact details

Telephone: 0121 414 5717
Email: s.brooks-wilson@bham.ac.uk
Twitter: @sbrookswilson

Address: School of Social Policy and Society
Muirhead Tower
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Sarah's academic research is concerned with children and young people’s varied journey impediments and their consequences.

Ideas are drawn from the new mobilities paradigm in order to problematise underexplored areas of children and young people’s lives. In particular, the rejection of static-place based societal understandings, allows movement inequalities to instead be foregrounded. Her research particularly develops ideas about convicted children’s contradictory mobilities, which arise from the coupling of ‘kinetic underclass’ membership with heightened compulsory journey demands, following a conviction. When not present and punctual, adverse outcomes can include long term unmet needs, service withdrawal and punishment. Her research strives to support the effective and proportionate treatment of children and young people who have a limited strategic voice in this somewhat overlooked policy area. As such, her recent academic work has become focused on the call for policy change through a ‘minimum mobility standard’, below which no child should fall. The Standard calls for an obligatory journey support offer to be made when children present with personal, household, locality/transport and service delivery problems that can result in journey impediments.

She has been working on an ESRC project in collaboration with Cheshire and Coventry Youth Justice Services. The project objectives are to design and distribute a visual communication tool that supports the enhancement of practice conversations on journey problems. The tool has been co-designed with young people in Cheshire and piloted by practitioners in Coventry. This tool forms an informal practice partnership with the policy-based minimum mobility standard. Following distribution within and beyond the youth justice sector, anticipated outcomes will include effective practice, enhanced attendance/engagement and a limitation of adverse outcomes, including prolonged unmet needs and punishment.

Qualifications

PhD in Social Policy, University of York
MRes Social Policy, University of York
BA (Hons) Social Policy, University of York
Postgraduate Certificate in Higher Education

Biography

A central theme of her work is the impact of institutional mobility requirements on marginalised groups. Research in schools revealed that children leading complex lives in low-income households face the greatest travel burden when accessing education (Brooks-Wilson and Snell, 2010). Research in the youth justice sector has shown that adverse outcomes arise when service access requirements exceed young people's capabilities, raising implications for policy and equitable service delivery (Brooks-Wilson 2020, 2023).

In terms of project leadership, Sarah has co-produced a resource with marginalised young people on service access to support journey planning and problem-solving (Brooks-Wilson, 2023). This resource was distributed to around 50 youth justice teams across England and Wales and has been shown to improve communication and planning while reducing personal safety risks. More recently, she contributed evidence to a youth justice service delivery restructure through research with young people on service access safety (Brooks-Wilson, 2025). She has also worked with Independent Travel Training Teams to build an evidence base on the value of travel training and empowerment for young people with additional needs, including a submission to the Public Accounts Committee in 2025. Sarah is currently collaborating with Nachammai Lakshmanan on Reimagining Situational Crime Prevention, a project that revisits Ron Clarke's pre-emptive, place-based approach to crime reduction, and extends it by engaging with young people as missing voices, and encompassing mobility alongside place.

Teaching

Crime and the City
Youth, Crime and Justice
Undergraduate Dissertation Workshops
Postgraduate Dissertation Workshops

Postgraduate supervision

Sarah is currently supervising the following PhD candidates:

• Fawaz Almalki — The institutional experiences of orphans in Saudi Arabia (with Sam Weston and Andy Jolly)
• Ben Sereda — Young people and public space (with Liam Wrigley and Dom Moran)
• Kerry Urquhart — The geometry of crime in the context of youth justice service delivery (with Steve Case; full ESRC funding secured)

Sarah welcomes enquiries from prospective PhD students. She can offer supervision in the following areas:

• Youth justice
• Crime and place
• Young people and social deprivation
• Mobility and socio-spatial adversity
• Barriers to mobility in everyday life

Other activities

Youth Justice Board Academic Advisory Panel Member (current)
Trustee, Association of Panel Members (current)
Postgraduate Committee Secretary, British Society of Criminology (2016-2017)
Executive Committee Member, Social Policy Association (2011-2014)
Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Publications

Recent publications

Article

Caulfield, L, Brooks-Wilson, S, Booth, J & Monaghan, M 2023, 'Engaging Parents to Reduce Youth Violence: Evidence from a Youth Justice Board Pathfinder Programme', Crime Prevention and Community Safety. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41300-023-00190-4

Brooks-Wilson, S 2023, 'The Youth Justice Commute (or the Institutional Construction of Youth Transport Poverty)', Youth Justice, pp. 1-18. https://doi.org/10.1177/14732254231202683

Brooks-Wilson, S 2020, 'Rethinking youth justice journeys: complex needs, impeded capabilities and criminalisation', Youth Justice, vol. 20, no. 3, pp. 309-327. https://doi.org/10.1177/1473225419893791

Brooks-Wilson, S & Snell, C 2012, '“Hard to Reach” or “Accessible When Approached”? Sustainable Development Discussions with Marginalized Pupil Groups', Children, Youth and Environments, vol. 22, no. 2, pp. 1. https://doi.org/10.7721/chilyoutenvi.22.2.0001

Chapter (peer-reviewed)

Brooks-Wilson, S 2025, Doing car-based youth justice appointments during young people’s mobility transitions. in G Martin & E Pearce (eds), Research Handbook on Youth Criminology. Edward Elgar, pp. 111-126. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781035300754.00015

Brooks-Wilson, S 2020, How geographical and ideological proximity impact community youth justice (in)accessibility in England and Wales. in E Heins, J Rees & M Pomati (eds), Social Policy Review 32. vol. 32, Policy Press/SPA, Bristol.

Snell, C & Brooks-Wilson, S 2014, Education for sustainable development and welfare reform: a very British case study? in T Fitzpatrick (ed.), International Handbook on Social Policy and the Environment. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham UK, Cheltenham, pp. 376.

Other contribution

Brooks-Wilson, S 2025, Public Accounts Committee Call for Evidence on Home to School Transport: Evidence on Independent Travel Training for Young People with SEND.

Brooks-Wilson, S 2023, Does bus boarding disable young people?. University of Birmingham. <https://blog.bham.ac.uk/socialsciencesbirmingham/2023/12/15/does-bus-boarding-disable-young-people/>

Brooks-Wilson, S 2023, Do Shifting Journey Cards help young people plan and problem solve independent travel?. <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN7c4phyHdo>

Other report

Brooks-Wilson, S 2025, Youth Justice Delivery Safety: Experiences of youth justice access and engagement - Final Report.

Brooks-Wilson, S 2023, Shifting Journey Cards: Final Report. University of Birmingham, Birmingham. <https://youthserviceaccess.files.wordpress.com/2023/06/shifting_final_28.6.23-1.pdf>

Caulfield, L, Brooks-Wilson, S, Booth, J & Monaghan, M 2022, West Midlands Violence Reduction Unit Evaluation: Serious Youth Violence pathfinder: Evaluation report . University of Wolverhampton.

Caulfield, L, Brooks-Wilson, S, Booth, J & Monaghan, M 2021, West Midlands Violence Reduction Unit Evaluation: Serious Youth Violence pathfinder: Evaluation report . University of Wolverhampton.

Paper

Brooks-Wilson, S & Lakshmanan, N 2026, 'Reimagining Situational Crime Prevention', Paper presented at Centre for Crime, Justice and Policing (CCJP) and UKRI-NPCC Policing Academic Centre of Excellence (P-ACE) Lab Annual Conference 2026, Birmingham, United Kingdom, 15/06/26 - 16/06/26.

View all publications in research portal