Youth Opportunity Fund: How we spent it in ... Reading
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
The youth opportunity fund panel in Reading has expanded to include a diverse range of young people, writes Tim Burke.
Reading's annual allocation amounts to £90,685 for its youth opportunity fund and £78,435 for its youth capital fund. Its panel meets three times each quarter to assess applications and make grants.
How was the panel created? "It was a bit of a scramble at the beginning, as I think it was for everyone" explains Tom Woolmer, Reading's participation and accreditation co-ordinator.
"A panel was drawn together mainly from our youth cabinet but we've since tried to expand beyond that. We advertised with a postcard campaign, targeting disadvantaged groups, explaining the support and the opportunities available.
"We've ended up with a representative panel, which includes young people from minority ethnic groups and teenagers not in employment, education or training, young carers and refugees.
"I think it was a bit difficult at first for them to grasp the level of responsibility they had, but then you become aware of the growth in understanding, their ability to focus and their increasing confidence - it's really good to see."
Some of the youth opportunity fund panellists have gone on to become members of the council's youth cabinet.
What were the challenges? "There had to be a focus on getting the applications to come directly from young people and not adults," says Woolmer. "It's been a challenge getting that message across to staff and young people. The questions had been a bit too open - they are now much more specific and it's clearer which sections must come from young people."
In order to ensure the participation of the voluntary sector, Reading has seconded Ben Cross, of Reading Council for Voluntary Youth Services, as development worker.
He is confident the funds are now reflective of the breadth of youth work in Reading: "The voluntary sector is consistently winning two-thirds of the money. That's very exciting - it means a wide range of groups are being supported, including faith groups who might not otherwise be able to access funding. It's been an eye-opener for the local authority to see how much work is being done by faith groups.
"The youth opportunity fund principles have also helped develop a greater understanding of participation in general across the voluntary sector."
What do young people say? Ollie Seye, 18, came to England from Nigeria as a young person and was recruited to the panel. "I wanted to make a difference," he explains. "I've not always been able to have a say about the decisions in my life and I want to help give that chance to others. It makes me very happy to see them able to follow up their ideas. When I arrived here, I was quite shy and I didn't speak English fluently. Being on the panel has helped me communicate and present myself much more effectively."
The future? In the short-term, the challenge is to hand out the underspend from previous rounds. This currently stands at £72,000 for the youth opportunity fund and £20,000 for the youth capital fund. Woolmer says that gives the council a lot of scope to encourage new applications.
He adds: "Long-term we're looking at developing the model and applying it more widely across council spending - it'll mean taking a close look at what the youth opportunity fund has taught us."
WHERE THE MONEY WENT
POSITIVE ACTIVITIES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE
The central government-backed Positive Activities for Young People (PAYP) provides activities for vulnerable young people and those from disadvantaged backgrounds. But changes to funding meant that key workers were unable to run activities over the summer holidays. With the help of a youth opportunity fund grant, Reading's PAYP team was able to provide water skiing, swimming, ice-skating, drop-ins and other new activities such as gorge walking in Wales. The money enabled the team to run 35 sessions plus a five-day residential. A total of 68 young people from a wide range of backgrounds and areas of Reading were engaged in the planning and activities.
ART PROJECT
This project received £2,500 to run art projects for young people from minority groups and young people leaving care. The scheme was supported by the youth offending service, leaving-care team and multi-ethnic counselling service Mothertongue, which applied for funds to run an art workshop. It brought together white, mixed-race and black young people with asylum seekers with limited English. They worked alongside a multi-ethnic staff group and conducted art research, discussed issues of identity and painted with artist support. The young people then helped plan an exhibition where work was auctioned, providing an opportunity to celebrate their creative achievements.
REACH TEAM
St Laurence's is a 12th century church in Reading that provides support and activities to children and young people. Separate to its faith work are the Reach Team and Reach Caversham projects, which work with young people. A youth opportunity fund grant of £20,000 helped keep the Caversham project going when it faced closure. Youth worker Chris West explains; "Making the bids opened the eyes of young people to the cost of running a youth centre. It's helped them gain responsibility for their club and helped us expand from working with 35 young people a week to 65." Bids are now submitted by a revolving set of young people to keep the project running and support other activities.