Our stories

Jack

Jack has been attending the Blaydon Inclusive Youth Session for 6 years, he continued to engage with youth workers during the pandemic via Zoom when Face to Face (F2F) youth sessions were halted. Jack was very happy to be back in the youth club with his friends after a long period of time secluded and isolated from his friends. Jack has volunteered at different places, had small bits of paid work but since the pandemic has not been able to find any paid or voluntary work. Jack is a bundle of energy who gets on board with any opportunities offered his way, he has been a strong member of the group who actively encourages others to get involved and supports his friends within the session. Jack is very curious, intelligent and willing to learn and adapt his skills set.

When the opportunity arose through the means of the Future You Pilot programme wherein NE Youth and Youth Focus have collaborated with different organisational partners in supporting under 25’s who are unemployed/economically inactive living within Gateshead, Jack was an ideal candidate who could benefit from support through this project. Skills 4 Work are an organisation based In Birtley Gateshead who work with young adults with additional needs and mental health conditions to transition from Education into Employment as well as Wellbeing enrichment activities. Skills 4 Work stood out as a very suitable organisation to support Jack into, to gain some employment skills, support with wellbeing and potentially find a work placement position that fits the needs of Jack.

Jack was supported to 4 different sessions at Skills 4 Work by a member of staff to help him slowly integrate into the project over the course of a month. These sessions included: Wellbeing Walking group, Gardening Group, Employability Sessions and the Community based sessions. On each occasion Jack participated extremely well, and made new friends and built on existing relationships with members whom he already knew.

He put a lot of endeavour into the gardening session particularly with one of the workers commenting on his effort and energy. After the 4th session where he was supported, Jack felt ready to go along to the project on his own without support and has been an active member for 2 months now attending all the sessions available on a weekly basis. He has recently been supported into a work placement where he is working on a Wednesday morning in a Café in Birtley, learning and building new skills including; customer service, time management, how to make and serve hot food and drinks and how to take orders.

Louise

Louise has attended the Blaydon Inclusive Youth Group for over 4 years. She continued to engage throughout Lockdown over Zoom and has been involved in a lot of the social action work the group have done over the last few years. Louise is a leader within the group, she always comes up with innovative ideas, sharing her opinions and always getting others involved. Louise has shone throughout a filming project with the Twisting Ducks Theatre Company, she wasn’t afraid to get up in front of the group and in front of the camera and played her part amazingly well. She was the driving force of the group with the ‘Walk and Talk’ sessions we ran in Summer 2022 and in the summer trips, despite her mobility issues, she gave all the summer activities a try. She was nervous at first to do the water activities especially and nearly didn’t do them, but with some encouragement from her peers and staff she got involved and she was very proud of herself for doing them. She said the surfing activity was one of the best days of her life.

Louise has recently turned 25 and at the age where she has to say goodbye to youth group. The group organised a leaving party for her and everyone was very emotional and sad to see her leave. She said “If I didn’t have the Blaydon Inclusive Youth Session I would have missed out on creating a lot of fun, exciting memories and my Wednesday evenings would have been boring.”