News, stories & updates

We are delighted to publish this years Impact Report 2021-22. Our Impact report demonstrates the positive impact Young Bristol continue to have on an increasing number of young people, in and around Bristol.

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This year's impact report was launched at our 2022 Annual General Meeting and Year In Review on Thursday 19th January 2023. Our AGM welcomed our staff team, Trustee Board and Vice Presidents. On the evening, we discussed the increasing impact we had during 2021-22 and how we plan to develop in our 2022-25 strategy.

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"Offering our city's youth a choice of opportunities and experiences, Young Bristol is a charity that makes a positive and sustainable impact on young people's lives."

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Our key highlights

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Some of our key highlights from the Impact Report include:

• 23,048 contacts with young people.
• 1,851 sessions delivered during 2021-22.
• 16 communities supported in Bristol and surrounding areas.
• 20 qualifications awarded to young people aged 8-25.
• Virgin Media O2 Captain Tom Foundation Connector Award was awarded to Young Bristol for our work in Ashton Vale's community.
• Finalists for the Charity of The Year Award at the 2021 Bristol Life Awards.

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"It is a great pleasure to celebrate what is being done at Young Bristol to help the young people of Bristol to develop the skills, experience and knowledge to support them in their lives and future careers."

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Download our 2021-22 Impact Report

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Last night, our corporate partner, Burges Salmon, kindly helped us to host our 2022 Annual General Meeting and Year In Review. The evening was well attended, with over 70 people joining us! Everyone thoroughly enjoyed looking through the impact we've had on young people and the wider community.

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The evening began by hearing from Young Bristol president, Jonathan Webb. He kindly welcomed everyone and thanked them for attending. Jonathan then kindly introduced Jamie Cameron, Young Bristol chair. Jamie outlined the Young Bristol strategy 2022-25 which includes; our buildings and facilities, our people, our programmes, our influence and our partnerships. He outlined how we have been following this strategy and how we plan to follow it in the future!

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Lee Williams was next to speak. He was able to talk about the release of our Impact Report 2021-22. Lee also discussed some important figures from the report; number of contacts we have had this year, number of sessions we have been able to run and how we have improved after Covid!

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The Year in Review then progressed to hearing from some of the young people we work with. First of all we heard from Youth Voice, who discussed their residential. It was great to hear feedback directly from the young people that went to Germany and how other young people should take part in residentials in the future!

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We then heard from Molly, a representative from the Outdoor Employment Programme, and Phil Harris. Molly was able to discuss how the Outdoor Employment Programme has been able to positively change her life around, even helping her to get her first paid job at the S.S Great Britain.

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The Annual General Meeting then proceeded to discussing what we look forward to. We heard from some of the management team, who discussed their respective areas and gave a positive update on our future plans. Thank you to Andy Kimber, Lucy Saunders and Matt Donnelly for presenting!

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Finally, we were able to present celebration of service awards. These were handed out as a recognition of long service to some of our amazing staff! Peaches Golding OBE CstJ handed these out to those who had given 5, 10, 15 and 20 years of service to Young Bristol! We would like to thank each and everyone one of our staff members for dedicating their time to make Young Bristol what it is today. 450 years of service has been dedicated to Young Bristol between all of the certificate winners!

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Thank you Burges Salmon for kindly hosting our 2022 Annual General Meeting and Year In Review! We would also like to thank our supporters, donors and funders for supporting and funding the work we do for young people.

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To find out more about other upcoming events like this one, click here!

Next week, The Grove @ Bedminster Down are set to host their very own Christmas fair!

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This year is the first year The Grove will be hosting a Christmas fair! A wide range of activities will be on offer for the whole family to enjoy; market stalls, Santa’s Grotto, raffle, games to entertain the kids, food and bar on site and so much more! This year, it is going to be hosted at Bedminster Down Ex Service Club, Winford Grove, BS13 7DY.

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The entrance fee for the Christmas fair is £1, which is to be paid on the door and will include a free raffle ticket! However, under 18’s come in for free!

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We will have a wide range of market stalls on offer, including;

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• Winnie’s Melts – Homemade wax melts, candles and novelty soap

• Cat’s tarots – tarot card readings

• Sarah Fowles – Personalised clothing, door signs and personalised jars

• Max Williams – Bespoke homeware items and furniture

• Hand painted baubles

• Jewellery, make-up, perfume, bath and body products

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You will even be able to visit Santa in his Grotto at the Christmas fair. We recommend that all guests book this experience in advance. Limited spaces are available, booking will ensure you a secured place. Availability to go into Santa's Grotto cannot be guaranteed on the day without a booking. To book Santa’s Grotto, click here.

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Address: Bedminster Down Ex Service Club, Winford Grove, BS13 7DY

Over the last few months, Architect students from UWE have gone above and beyond to engage with the community in Ashton Vale. This is the beginning of their masters project. Local Councillor, Tessa Fitzjohn, gave the students a brief to look at the wetlands adjacent to the Longmoor Village development. The brief was written in hopes that it would create sustainability for the area but also create an understanding for the value of the natural environment.

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Their first meeting with Young Bristol was on the 5th October. Using Ashton Vale Club for Young People, the University group met with Tessa Fitzjohn and the TVG friends’ group. During this meeting, they discussed the initial aims of the project. This meeting lead to the students being guided around Ashton Vale, familiarising themselves with the area and the context surrounding the wetlands.

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On the 25th October, Young Bristol’s Silver Social welcomed the University students to their session. Members of Silver Social were some of the first people to ever live in Ashton Vale.  The chat they had was very insightful, finding out how some of the locals may use the wetlands and what improvements could be made to the area so more locals can access it. It was great for everyone at the meeting to learn the history behind Ashton Vale.

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All of their findings from meeting with Young Bristol and other organisations such as Ashton Vale Primary School, Manor Woods Valley Group, and Bristol River Avon Trust, were collected together. This gave the group a chance to reflect on all their findings before presenting. They were able to create a number of storyboards and interactive models to present to Ashton Vale’s local community.

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Yesterday, 8th December, was the day that the UWE students presented their findings to the local community at Ashton Vale Community Centre. A large group of local residents were able to attend to see their findings, as well as a few people from local trusts and organisations. UWE students proposed that a boardwalk is built around the wetlands. The boardwalk will deter visitors from walking across the wetland, helping preserve the valuable area. Their idea was inspired by Iron Line, located in Cumbria. The local residents engaged with this presentation very well! Some attendants even presented their own ideas to everyone and offered their help to try turn this idea into a reality. From this presentation, a Facebook and email group has been set up, where everyone can continue the conversation and keep the idea alive.

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We hope that their development can come to life in the future. The boardwalk and visitor centre will allow us to take young people on nature walks around the local area. This will get them exploring their local community and encouraging healthy activities.

This week at Ashton Vale Club for Young People, staff from across the youth club network came together and took part in team building activities.

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The evening started off with a game of staff bingo. This was an activity for the group to walk around, talk to new people and get to know facts about each other. The group used the bingo grid to ask staff questions such as “do you have a cat?”, “do you have a sibling?” and even “can you hula-hoop?”. A great ice-breaker to start the evening! We had two groups win this activity, BS14 Stockwood Youth Club and Hartcliffe Club for Young People.

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The group then gathered into smaller groups. In these groups, staff discussed what is going well at their clubs, and what they think could be improved. They wrote this on an A3 sheet of paper, separating it to discuss each person’s club. The small groups proceeded to share their discussion with the whole group. There was even some cross-group discussion, some agreeing with points made and others arguing against ideas. It was great to see healthy debates among the groups.

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The evening finished by asking the groups to think independently, what events the youth clubs and young people would like to see across the club network. The group came up with some amazing ideas and even talked about how they could host these ideas next year. We are excited to see some new inter-club competitions and events next year!

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To find out more about our Community Youth Clubs, click here.

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Young Bristol have partnered with Super Sliders UK and took young people to try out new sports!

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What a great way for young people to start off their weekend! Young Bristol Outdoor Employment Programmme Trainee’s, and other young people from all over the UK were invited to University of Bath’s Sports Training Village to take part in the Bronze Super Sliders Programme. The programme was packed full of fun activities, where young people learnt how to bobsleigh and skeleton.

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The day started with “off-track” workshops. The group were lucky enough to have this first workshop hosted by GB Bobsleigh legend, Lamin Deen OLY and Skeleton champion, Abi P! This workshop is where the group practised techniques and getting used to the bobsleigh and skeleton equipment.

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The day continued onto “on-track” sliding sessions, getting the group on the track to practice bobsleighing and skeleton. The “on-track” sessions were led by GB legend Ben Simons MSc OLY and Donna Creighton, champion from British Bobsleigh and Skeleton Association. The group were able to take it in turns to push themselves down the track, using the techniques they had learnt from the first “off-track” workshops.

Bullying can happen to anyone. If you are being bullied, whether it's online, at school, at work or in any other environment, you are not alone! It can feel very difficult to reach out when you feel alone or isolated. Young Bristol have collected information about bullying and resources you can use for advice in light of anti bullying week 2022.

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What is bullying?

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Bullying is unwanted and potentially aggressive behaviour. This can stem from an imbalance of power and is always a repeated incident over a period of time. Bullying can take place in many forms, however, it is always deliberate and directed. Some specific examples of bullying include:

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• Sexism - bullying focused on someone being of the opposite sex.
• Racism - bullying focused on someone being of a certain race or skin colour.
• Cyber bullying - targeting an individual online. Can be anonymous but can be from someone you know.
• Homophobic - bullying focused on someone being a certain sexual orientation.
• Religious - bullying focused on someone's beliefs or faiths

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Getting help for bullying

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Ignoring bullying will never make it go away. As hard as it may be, bullying needs to be reported to a trusted adult. No one deserves to be bullied

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If you are being bullied at school, your school should have an anti bullying policy in place. Report the issue to a trusted teacher, or a friend who can report this for you. You can also speak to a school nurse, councillor, welfare officer or any one else at your school you may trust. You can also tell your parents and carers, they can report this to the school for you.

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If you are being bullied online, you can report abuse and bullying on any social media channel. They should all have an abuse and anti bullying policy in place. Make sure to keep reporting the bullying until it has stopped. Reporting it one time sometimes may not be enough. Tell a parent, carer or close relative, there are here to help you.

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If you are being bullied outside of school/work, talk to your parents, carers and close relatives. Our youth clubs are also a safe space for all young people. You can report any bullying to one of our trained staff and they can help this to be reported or resolved.

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Where to get advice

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We've discussed reporting any bullying issues, but where can you get extra advice on bullying? If you ever need to talk to someone about bullying, some of our partners are here to talk. We have collected information from partners both locally and nationally who can help you.

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National advice

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• NSPCC - This is a national charity that offer help to young people experiencing abuse, mental health and bullying. They provide services from Monday to Friday, 10:00am - 4:00pm.
• National bullying helpline - This help line was designed specifically to tackle bullying and offers a helpline to anyone who needs to talk about any bullying issues that occur, no matter what environment the bullying is taking place. 
• Young Minds - Your mental health may be affected as a result of bullying. They are a national charity that supports young people and parents with mental health and bullying.
• Childline - A national help service which offers support surrounding bullying, abuse, your safety and the law.
• Mind - If your mental health is being affected after being bullied, it's normal to feel low. Mind is another charity who target helping people with their mental health.

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Bristol based advice

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• Off the record - This Bristol-based charity offers a mental health support team. They also offer hubs that you can attend and talk to someone about any issues you'd like to discuss.
• Bristol Mind - This local Bristol charity offers a wide range of support, counselling and training.
• SARI - The charity is more tailored towards racism and inequality. On their website, you can report hate crimes and they can provide support to any victims of hate crime.
• Unique Voice - This Bristol based company run anti-bullying workshops for schools across Bristol. The workshops they run are eye-opening and can help towards the prevention of bullying. We recommend their programs to all schools across Bristol.

On Monday 7th November, The Grove @ Bedminster Down Youth Club hosted the NatWest Thrive Awards Graduation, joining 8 other clubs who took part in the programme.

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What a great start to Youth Work Week 2022! The Grove were able to attract over 20 young people and adults to the graduation, celebrating all the skills that had been learnt across the course of the programme and the amazing things that young people had achieved!

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The Graduation was hosted by Luke Vernon, who took care of the 9 nine clubs throughout the evening on Zoom. All of the clubs attending were able to introduce themselves and meet new people from across the country. Each club then discussed what impact the Thrive programme has had with their young people and why it was so important to their club. The introductions were followed by a game of “famous failures”. Tensions and excitement were high between all the groups, hoping that they would be the first one to answer the questions correctly.

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It was later announced that there would be a special guest joining the Zoom call. There was a buzz of excitement in the room, with everyone trying to guess who the special guest would be.

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The group all managed to guess that the special guest was Marcus Rashford! He was able to join the Zoom call for an hour and announce the award winners from each club. Congratulations to Max from The Grove who was Young Bristol’s award winner. After announcing the awards, each winner was able to speak to Marcus Rashford and ask him a question each!

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We would like to thank Marcus Rashford and NatWest Thrive for teaching young people about money management. We would also like to thank the NYA for supporting this programme and making the sessions possible. It is great to see all the skills that young people have learnt over the course of the programme!

Thanks to the staff at Hartcliffe Youth Club, we took over 20 young people on a Barton Camp residential!

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On Wednesday 26th October, members of Hartcliffe Youth Club travelled to Barton Camp for a two-night getaway! For some of these young people, it was their first time away without their families. Before the coaches arrived, the group came together to eat lunch and discuss what their adventures would entail. It was great to hear all young people buzzing with excitement for their trip away together.

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After a long wait for the coaches and an even longer drive, they arrived at Barton Camp. The group had time to relax, unpack and settle into their surroundings before getting involved with the wide range of activities that were on offer.

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The rest of the day was spent doing a wide range of activities, including making jam jar lanterns. As Halloween was swiftly approaching, it was great for the group to do some Halloween themed activities to get them in the spirits for the spooky season.  Young people were able to get stuck into this activity by using a wide range of craft materials. The group created some marvellous lanterns which they took home to display.

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Thursday 27th October, the group partnered with Youth Moves! This gave our young people the opportunity to engage and bond with a new group of people. The group from Youth Moves happened to be from Knowle, who currently have a postcode divide with Hartcliffe. 50 young people, who would never normally meet, joined together to make new bonds and friendships. Amazingly, this broke down barriers between the postcode divide!

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The group finished off their trip with a splash in the pool. They all had endless turns on the slide which was enough to make anyone dizzy. In the pool, the two groups of young people met for the last time before returning home. It was amazing to see them bond once more.

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Friday 28th October, the group said their final goodbyes to Barton Camp. Our young people returned home worn out from their first trip away together. The residential trip was enjoyed by all of our staff and young people!

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To find out about our community youth clubs and how you can get involved with similar activities, click here!