St Mellons Youth Club Summer Programme Report 2022

St Mellons Youth Club Summer Programme Report 2022

By Clare Barnett Senior Youth Officer

This summer we were able to offer a full programme of activities in St Mellons and Llanrumney and offer young people the opportunity to take part in adventurous activities within the city. With funding from Cardiff, St David’s Rotary, Child Friendly Cities and Cardiff Youth Service we managed to put together a five week programme of activities that saw 780 attendances by young people over 36 sessions.

Into Construction

The summer holidays began with a whole week of our Into Construction Course running daily from 10am -2pm for young people aged 16 plus who were interested in getting into the field of construction. With support from Arco and Blacksheep training we were able to deliver sessions around Working at Height, Asbestos Awareness and how to prep for the CSCS Card test. A group of ten males participated and thoroughly enjoyed the course. The boys will now go onto practice further for the test a plan to take it in September so that they can begin to work on building sites with a view to securing apprenticeships in Construction.

Fit n Fed at St Mellons Youth Club and Eastern Leisure Centre

We offered young people accessing the summer programme the opportunity to access a free lunch time meal each day. Packed lunches were made up for those young people taking part in activities such as football, basketball, rounders, tennis, dodgeball, cricket, swimming and off site activities such as the Aqua Park trips.

Young Driver Academy

With heavily discounted ticket prices available through the Summer of Fun funding we were able to offer 8 pupils that had been on our Youth Mentor’s caseloads the opportunity of a driving lesson at the Young Driver Academy in Maindy. Jayden, Cameron, Oliver, Josh, Harvey, Neveah and Jade all had a fantastic time and got to have a go at three point turns, reversing around corners, driving through cones and reversing. The driving instructors were great with them and they are all now keen to save up to book driving lessons when they turn 17. We are going to continue to use activities such as these as rewards for our vulnerable pupils on caseload to inspire them to remain focused and motivated to gain additional qualifications in the last year of school.

Trips to the Aqua Park

We took two groups of 12 young people to the Aqua Park in Cardiff Bay on Thursday 4^th and Thursday 11^th August as a reward for good behaviour. They had a fantastic time and behaved really well on the trip. The Summer of Fun funding from Child Friendly Cities helped us to be able to access this activity for free which was fantastic and all of the young people said that they would definitely love to visit the Aqua Park again next year.

Barry Island Trips

We took two trips to Barry Island over the summer the first on the 10^th Aug with the Seniors and the second on the 17^th Aug with the juniors. The young people got to have a go on the rides in the pleasure beach and explore the arcades and playing crazy golf, before having chip shop chips on the beach – trying at all costs to avoid the seagulls. A great time was had by all and luckily the weather was on our side – not boiling hot but not pouring with rain either.

 Kayaking Trips with Storey Arms

We were very lucky that the Summer of Fun funding also afforded us the opportunity to work with Storey Arms to take our well behaved youth club members onto Kayaking trips on the River Taff at Radyr Weir with qualified instructors Josh and Ryan from Storey Arms who came to meet us at Radyr Weir and brought all of the kit with them. For some of the young people it was the first time they have ever got to try this activity and they all really enjoyed themselves and said that they would all love to do it again in the future.

Emergency Services Days

The Cardiff East Youth Action Group worked closely with PCSO’s Chris and Honarata to organise two Emergency Service Days this year. The first was at St Mellons Hub on Friday 5^thAugust 2022 and the second the following Friday was at Eastern Leisure Centre. Both were very well attended with between 300 – 400 people from the local communities visiting each day. We had lots of partners delivering activities including St Johns Ambulance, South Wales Police, Hafod Housing, South Wales Fire Service, St Mellons Community Gardeners, the Army, Ministry of Life, Wales and West Housing, Together for Short Lives, the Really Wild Show as well as our team and the street-based team, the active involvement team and the wellbeing team delivering lots of fun activities to engage young people. At the St Mellons event we ran the kitchen serving hot and cold drinks as well as snacks and hot dogs and at Llanrumney we were lucky to have a local St Mellons resident come to serve Jamaican dishes. We had great feedback from the community and partner agencies, and it was lovely to see everyone coming together.

Summer Camp

We took 31 young people to our Summer Camp at the Picket Pods in Llandow near Cowbridge from 22^nd-24^th August. 17 of the young people were from Cardiff East aged 11-13 and had participated in the Summer Programme. The young people had a fantastic time participating in activities such as circus skills, it’s a knockout, tie dying t-shirts, soldering wood, a pride party, a silent disco, an outdoor cinema, a campfire and surfing. They all said that they would love to do it again and stay for longer next year.

Evaluation

We evaluated the summer programme with both staff and the young people that participated to capture their thoughts on what we felt was a jam packed, five week summer programme and had really good feedback and some suggestions for next year’s programme.

Staff:

‘It was lovely to see the young people building relationships with other young people from across the city on summer camp it really helped them to leave their comfort zones and get involved’. Nel Youth Support Worker

‘The young people starting High School in September really made new connections and built their confidence by getting to make new friends in the area through the Fit n Fed sessions’.  Emma Leader in Charge.

 ‘I have loved working the summer programme this year, I will really miss it next year.’ Callum Youth Support Worker

‘Definitely do another summer camp the young people absolutely loved that’ Sarah Youth Support Worker

‘Maybe do a big day trip to a theme park like Alton Towers or Thorpe Park maybe?’ Ebonie Trainee Youth Worker

Youth Club Members:  

‘The Aqua Park trip was awesome – it would be wicked if we could go again next year’ Jayden 14

‘I loved the kayaking – knocking Callum in was loadsa fun’ Kyon 11

‘The Young Driver Academy trip really has inspired me to save up for proper driving lessons when I turn 17’ Jade 16

‘I really enjoyed the summer camp and getting to make friends with new people’ Maddie 13

‘I loved making new friends during the summer programme’ Georgia 12

‘I enjoyed meeting new people and overcoming challenges and conquering fears’ Dylan 12

‘I loved the whole summer programme – I thought it was amazing’ Janey-Leigh 11

St Mellons Summer Programme 2022 Costings

Staffing                                    =            £1500

Hire of Eastern Leisure           =            £930

Minibus Hire                            =            £700

Food                                        =            £1600

Refreshments                          =            £300

Arts Resources                        =            £150

Young Driver Places                =             £80

Kayaking                                  =             Summer of Smiles Funded

Total                                         =             £5260

Donation from Rotary St Davids =              £2000

Funded by Cardiff Youth Service =             £3260

Special thanks:                

Peter Rice & Ken Truman – Cardiff, St David’s Rotary.

Claire Horwood & Team @ Storey Arms

Staff who worked during the summer programme – Emma Tumelty, Nel Philp, Ebonie Price, Joseph Jones, Theresa Sullivan, Callum Bingham, Gareth Bendle and Sarah Tannetta.