- Area:
- East Midlands
- Programme:
- Young People's Fund Grants to Organisations
- Release date:
- 7 2 2007
Rainbows Children’s Hospice will offer innovative services to help young people with long-term illnesses achieve greater independence with a Big Lottery Fund grant of £66,255.
The grant is one of seven being made today to groups across the East Midlands from a pot of cash worth £591,227 to the region. The money is from BIG’s Young People’s Fund and will today benefit groups in Leicester, Chesterfield, Buxton, Kirkby, Lincoln and Nottinghamshire.
Many of the children and young people visiting Loughborough-based Rainbows Children’s Hospice have long-term illnesses and complex needs. Rainbows aims to support these young people’s autonomy and promote their active involvement in decisions that affect the care they receive; like any young people they are keen to make their own, independent choices.
Today’s award will help Rainbows to further develop their service with the appointment of a new youth worker: this will enable Rainbows to focus specifically on those issues that affect young people facing long term, life threatening situations alongside the usual complexities of adolescence and transition.
Alison Cooke, Rainbows Director of Care, said: “A significant number of teenagers and young people use the services at Rainbows’ Children’s Hospice, and we are continuing to develop our services to meet their ongoing needs. The young people who use our service develop strong, trusting relationships with staff members who work with them and their families to ensure that they are all involved in decision-making and the planning of any care that may be required.
“We are delighted to hear that we have been awarded funding towards the appointment of a Youth Worker. We feel this role will vastly enhance the support that we are able to offer to young people, both through direct contact with the individuals concerned and through staff support, training and education.”
Up the road in Nottinghamshire, the Kirkby Trust is today waking up to the news of a £21,585 grant from BIG. The work of the Trust is essential to the people of Ashfield: they provide educational and recreational activities for young people and their families, and support and accommodation to homeless 16 – 25 year olds.
Michael Aspinall, Housing Support Manager at the Kirkby Trust, explains how the Lottery money will be used: “This award provides the Kirkby Trust with an excellent opportunity to help make a positive impact on the lives of young homeless 16–25 year olds living in the Kirkby In Ashfield and surrounding area, through offering a twelve-week life skills course, which will be run three times a year.
“This course will benefit homeless 16-25 year olds confidence and self esteem in being able to sustain future tenancies, promote healthy living and empower them to re-engage with further education, training, voluntary work and employment helping them to reach their full potential.”
Down in Leicester, a new three-year programme of diverse arts activities, STRETCH, will be rolled out with the news of a £125,253 grant to Soft Touch Arts. STRETCH will aim to support young people who are not engaging with mainstream education services, and help them to progress with personal, social and learning goals.
Christina Wigmore from Soft Touch Arts, says: “The S-T-R-E-T-C-H programme is a really exciting development for Soft Touch Arts. It will make a big impact on our ability to offer a meaningful, long term arts activity programme, which will respond directly to what disadvantaged young people with an interest in arts and music are telling us they want to do.
“Through a combination of 12 outreach projects and a regular weekly drop-in session, around 370 young people will gain new creative skills, leading to personal development and progression opportunities. Some young people will move on to undertake the nationally recognised NVQ 1 equivalent Arts Award and become more involved in the management of the programme as peer mentors and steering group members. All participants will receive a record of achievement award and get involved in organising exhibition and performance events to showcase their talent and share the creative work they produce.”
Big Lottery Fund Head of East Midlands Region, Mick McGrath, said: "Today’s grants for the East Midlands show BIG’s commitment to young people - it’s great to see Lottery funds used to invest in young people and provide much needed services and activities. These essential projects – all with young people at the helm - will go a long way towards allowing issues faced by young people to be more widely understood by the general public. I'm also confident that today's funding will improve our communities and enhance the lives of the people that live in them."
Other areas are also set to benefit from Young People's Fund grants - please see the full list of today's awards below:
| Organisation | Location | Project | Award |
| The Kirkby Trust Limited | Ashfield | This twelve-week course will equip young adults with the skills and confidence needed for living independently. Participants will be identified as having housing issues and may also have disengaged with formal education, employment and training. This project will be the first step to start to access more training or volunteering. | £21,585 |
| Old Whittington Recreation Ground | Derbyshire | This project is to provide youth club facilities for the young people of Whittington due to an increasing problem of anti-social behaviour in the local area. | £71,404 |
| Rural Arts and Education Project | Derbyshire | This project will provide free and accessible creative training in rural crafts such as welding and blacksmithing for hard-to-reach young people aged 13-19 years old of age who experience limited access to professional and career focused training and advice. | £106,662 |
| Soft Touch Arts | Leicester | STRETCH is a three-year programme of arts activities such as creative writing and digital photography for young people from deprived areas of Leicestershire to progress with personal, social and learning goals. | £125,253 |
| Rainbows Children's Hospice | Leicestershire | This project will offer facilities for young people aged 11-25 years old affected by cancer or a life limiting threatening condition. The service will facilitate communication between young people in order to address their isolation, education, health and social care issues and the psychological and emotional effect of the illness or disability. | £66,255 |
| soundLINCS | Lincolnshire | This three-year project will enable young people from rural areas to take part in a diverse range of music based activities including producing and recording a piece of music, creating sound sculptures, djing and radio presenting.£99,364 | £99,364 |
| The National Autistic Society | Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire | This three-year project will provide social and life skills groups in Nottinghamshire and Northamptonshire for young people with Asperger syndrome. The project aims to reduce the feelings of isolation expressed by vulnerable young people and provide them with the skills and confidence to go on and live independent lives. | £100,704 |
Further information
Big Lottery Fund Press Office: 020 7211 1888
Out of hours contact: 07867 500 572
Public Enquiries Line: 08454 102030
Textphone: 0845 6021 659
Full details of the Big Lottery Fund programmes and grant awards are available on the website: www.biglotteryfund.org.uk
Notes to Editors
- The Young People’s Fund in England was launched in September 2004. Funding from the Young People’s Fund open grants programme in England can be accessed through three specific strands: £10 million for applications from individuals, £40 million in grants to voluntary organisations/ partnerships, £27.6 million will go to national organisations for large projects.
- The Big Lottery Fund's Board has agreed to allocate a further £100m to the extension of the Young People's Fund programme in England. The money will be allocated in 2006 following a paper to the Big Lottery Fund’s Board that develops the possible options for the extension. These options will be developed to reflect the learning from our current programmes and to compliment the messages of the DfES Youth Green Paper that is to be published soon.
- The Young People’s Fund aims to put young people at the centre of creating, planning and delivering projects to achieve the following:
- Being healthy: enjoying good physical and mental health and living a healthy lifestyle
- Staying safe: being protected from harm and neglect and growing up able to look after themselves
- Enjoying and achieving getting the most out of life and developing the skills for adulthood
- Making a positive contribution: to the community and society and not offending or behaving anti-socially
- Economic wellbeing: overcoming disadvantages to achieve their full potential in life.
- The success criteria for this programme include young people’s involvement at every stage of the project from start to finish and the project delivering on at least, two of the five Young People’s Fund programme aims. To be considered applicants will need to demonstrate how they intend to achieve both of these objectives.
- Big Lottery Fund is the joint operating name of the New Opportunities Fund and the National Lottery Charities Board (which made grants under the name of the Community Fund). The Big Lottery Fund, launched on 1 June 2004, is distributing half of all National Lottery good cause funding across the UK.
- The Big Lottery Fund is building on the experience and best practice of the merged bodies to simplify funding in those areas where they overlap and to ensure Lottery funding provides the best possible value for money. To date, the two merged Funds have committed more than £6 billion to initiatives with national, regional and local partners from the public, voluntary, charity and private sectors, with a particular focus on disadvantage.
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