Leicestershire Cares has helped me find out about different career opportunities. It has also given me the confidence and supported me onto a Teaching Assistance course, as well as finding a volunteering opportunity in a primary school helping kids that are struggling with maths.
Sophie, Care Experienced Young Person
The summer of 2021 saw Leicestershire Cares’ Leaving Care Team engineer conversations between care experienced young people and professionals in their dream career. The project saw our, care leaver professional volunteer mentors, continue to use their expertise, networks and insight, to support young people with their confidence, UCAS applications and general life advice. We saw the start of our Joining Up Joining In (JUJI) project, which seeks to help care experienced young people and estranged young people find solutions to avoid falling into crime, and we reflected on the end of Mind Matters project which supported care experienced young people with their mental wellbeing through the pandemic.
We also carried on supporting care experienced young people to deal with isolation by building peer to peer support, helped them look for work, training and education and supported them to have their voices heard about the issues affecting them and feeded into the English Inependent Care Review – and their stories told all over Zimbabwe.
Finally, Thermo Fisher Scientific pick up an Outstanding Contribution to work with Care Experienced Young People Award at our Champions Awards night.
Catch up with our Summer's work
Levelling up the care experienced network deficiency
Using our Power to Change Approach, which focuses on building relationships, networks and connections, to help care experienced young people get on in life
Creating conversation between care experienced young people and their dream career
How hosting a Meet an Employer Event for care experienced young people can open doors to new networks and knowledge
Mind Matters: How tackling loneliness taught us the power of community among care leavers
Developing peer to peer support to battle poor mental wellbeing and isolation in care experienced young people
Leicestershire Cares’ contribution to the Care Review so far
Our leaving care team has been working with our care experienced young people to make sure their views are heard by the Independent Review of Children’s Social Care
I’ve really enjoyed working together. So often we are left on our own to get on with life. It can result in things not getting done, and that leads to impacting on our confidence and self-esteem. It’s so easy to let yourself down. We’ve been conditioned by society that way. But working together gives you energy and ideas. We create a unique crazy way of getting the job done.
Participant – Youth Participation Day
Power to overcome: Care experienced young people challenging themselves at Beaumanor Hall
Leicestershire Cares takes it’s care experienced young people for a day of teambuilding, high ropes and pushing themselves out of their comfort zone
From Leicester to Zimbabwe with Care
Leicestershire Cares Taking Hold of Our Heritage book is used as a resource in Zimbabwe Care Leavers Network Advocacy Strategic Planning day
Developing Leaders - Young People’s Participation Day
Leicestershire Cares’ Participation Day empowering our young people to become leaders in their own lives, communities and drive the direction of our work
Going Forward
Creating Jobs
The Leaving Care project is looking to create a Kickstart position within the team. We hope to find a care experienced young person that will support our Leaving Care work and develop and learn their employability skills while on the job.
Designing Frameworks to evaluate our work
We are creating a new evaluation framework for the interactions our young people are having with businesses and visa-versa. We will soon be looking for businesses to work alongside our young people to develop the framework
Working with Youth Clubs and Youth Hubs
We are looking to develop our partnership work with local community groups and youth clubs to support their care experienced young people and estranged young people find solutions to avoiding falling into crime and create positive outcomes for their futures.
Our work with care experienced young people
- Find out about the work we do with care experienced young people: mental wellbeing, employment and training, campaigning for Care Leavers rights, building social connection.
- Promise to Care Toolkit
- Sign our Promise to Care
- Hear the voices of care experienced young people in our Podcasts
- Taking Hold of Our Heritage project. Get a digital download of the book
- Become a mentor to a care experienced young person
For more information about our work with care experienced young people, please contact Jacob Brown: jacob@leicestershirecares.co.uk