Birmingham

Based in the heart of Firs and Bromford Estate we bring together youth work and adult-focused asset-based community-building work to maximise the opportunities for intergenerational (as well as cross-cultural) interaction and relationship-building. 

We run several Open Access safe spaces for young people giving them the opportunity to engage with their peers and positive adult role-models in a safe space. We are always looking for ways in which both young people and local neighbours can contribute to these spaces, mainly through our Youth Social Action programme. We offer 1:1 and group mentoring, both in the community setting or in the school setting.  We also engage young people through our youth connector detach team, building relationship with groups of young people down the park, on the street corners, outside the shops, working with young people “where they are at”.

We also offer:

Schools Based - We run a 6 week schools based programme enabling students to explore community, their gifts, skills and passions and work with them to plan and deliver a youth led community project.
WeCan - Community Based YSA - Our “We Can” sessions engage local young people in long term intergenerational Youth Social Action.  Helping young people to connect with their neighbours and have a role within their community through meaningful, youth led, social action projects.
Street Connecting and street sports - We are passionate about “widening the circles” of our youth work, through our youth connector detach team we engage young people, building relationship with groups of young people down the park, on the street corners, outside the shops, working with young people “where they are at”.


We also run a social enterprise: Gear Up.

Impact Story:

RB is a young lad aged 16 we have known for several years. From being mentored in school due to  family bereavement, attending our after-school club as a 9-year-old, youth social action projects in  school and the community, to attending our youth club on Wednesday nights. RB started to  disengage with us about 18 months ago, he moved away for a short period after getting mixed up  in a few things locally, and we hadn't heard from him in quite a while. 
A few months ago, he moved back locally with his Mum, and he had popped in a few times to say  hello, but didn’t really seem keen to re-engage in the youth club.  We recently started a new Creative group alongside a new volunteer, and we chatted to him at a  recent community event. Since then, he has been attending regularly and has been really  enthusiastic about the group. The music and particularly the lyric writing has been a really  important outlet for him and helped him express his feelings much better.

Together We Can! is an intergenerational, community-building project within the Firs & Bromford neighbourhood which we run with our partner, Open Door Community Foundation.  

Funded jointly by the National Lottery Community Fund and Firs & Bromford Neighbours Together (Big Local funding), the project brings together youth work and adult-focused community-building work to maximise the opportunities for intergenerational (as well as cross-cultural) interaction and relationship-building.  We seek to support both young people and adults on a developmental journey from ‘first contact’, through ‘clearing obstacles’ and ‘pathways into participation’, towards being able to ‘make meaningful contributions’ (within the neighbourhood and wider), and to develop skills, confidence and connections to initiate and lead their own groups and activities.
Across the two ‘age bands’ (young people and adults), TWC! pursues two parallel ‘strands’ of work: ‘street connecting’ (making connections with, and between, local people, and growing new forms of associational life from those connections), and ‘support and development’ (supporting local people to grow in the confidence, skills and connections needed to be able to participate in and contribute to the life of their neighbourhood, and wider).
Our most recent Progress Report for this project can be found here.

Birmingham Branch Contact Information:

Dan Sandford-Smith

The Hub
146 Bromford Drive B36 8TY
Tel: 0121 448 3739


Email:
dan.smith@worthunlimited.co.uk

If you would like to volunteer with us, please see our volunteering page for more information.