News, stories & updates

Young Bristol were thrilled to be part of an international photography project, connecting young people in Bristol and Guangzhou, China to mark the 20th Anniversary of the twinned cities.

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During 2021, young people from Ashton Vale Club for Young People, visited Brandon Hill and Ashton Court with experts from Bristol Museum to capture photographs of nature in the heart of their city. The group were inspired by a BBC Countryfile item filmed on Brandon Hill about macro lenses fixed to mobile phones. 

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Meanwhile in China, a group of young photographers from local schools also took part in a similar activity capturing plants and animals. 

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The photographs taken during the project were shared amongst both groups, giving an opportunity for the young people to explore and comment on the images captured in both of the cities.

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"The pink and green look good together, it is very detailed.” - Alfie, 13, Hartcliffe Club for Young People

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"The combination of light and shadow is full of mystery. The photographer seems to be looking at their shadow.” - FU Jianyang, Guangzhou Development Zone Foreign Language School

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"The water looks like little worlds and the colours catch my eyes.” - Cameron, 8, Ashton Vale Club for Young People

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"I think it is very quiet, because the sun shines brightly and the trees are very big.” - HUANG Xiran, Guangzhou No. 86 Middle School

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A book of the images, with a forward by Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees and Johnny Keeling, Head of the BBC Natural History Unit, will be presented to Guangzhou as an official anniversary gift. The project was funded by Bristol City Council and the Guild of Guardians.

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You can find out more about the partnership and view all images here.

We are incredibly proud to share that Young Bristol has been recognised in the 2022 Bristol Young Heroes Awards.

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The Bristol Young Heroes Awards recognises and celebrates the valuable contribution of young people aged 11 – 19 throughout Bristol. The awards also recognise groups and organisations which have shown exceptional team skills and dedication to benefit young people.

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This year, Chardonnay, a young volunteer at Ashton Vale Club for Young People, has been shortlisted for the Bristol Young Heroes ‘Action Hero’ Award!

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Chardonnay was nominated by the team at Ashton Vale for her amazing growth since joining the Youth Club in 2014 and volunteering three nights per week for over 2 years.

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Chardonnay, who suffers from anxiety and has learning difficulties, has flourished over the years, becoming a trusted and valued member of the team, helping to deliver activities, running the tuck shop at Club, and even supporting her local over 55’s Silver Social Club. The elderly members of the Club cannot speak highly enough of her!

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"Chardonnay suffered from a bereavement earlier this year, and even through this difficult time, she continued to support the staff and club every week" says Lead Youth Worker Julie Chapman, "This dedication to her community really puts her above the rest!”

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Congratulations to all of the young people and groups who are finalists for this year's awards – we wish all candidates the best of luck! The Bristol Young Heroes Awards ceremony will take place on Friday 15th July 2022.

Through our Corporate Partnerships, local companies can demonstrate how they are supporting young people and local communities across Bristol, and how they are taking their social responsibility seriously.

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Young Bristol highlights the incredible support of our corporate partner Leggwork, who has supported Young Bristol's work through donations, in-kind support and voluntary days during 2021-22. 

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The local construction recruitment business, first began supporting Young Bristol in April 2021 when they donated Easter Eggs to young people during the pandemic. Since then Leggwork have provided ongoing support to Young Bristol, volunteering at Ashton Vale Club for Young People and BS14 Youth Club, as well as donating to support development at our programmes.  

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Hear from Directors, James Legg and Justin Gettings, about their most recent voluntary day at BS14 Youth Club and how their support is helping to support our cause.

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Wanting to make a difference? 

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Become a Corporate Partner and support our work today! Find out more.

We are thrilled to share that 2 young people from our Creative Wellbeing programme have successfully completed their Arts Award Bronze certificates!

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Two members of The Grove @ Bedminster Down, Alfie and Ellis aged 12, were awarded their Arts Award Bronze certificates for their participation in our 12-week Creative Wellbeing Programme, developing creative ways to improve mental health through reflective and expressive workshops.

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This 12-week project has been kindly funded by Groundwork UK and Comic Relief, and saw 13 young people aged 8 - 19 take part in a series of activities and workshops, learning about local artists, taking part in community social-action, and delivering a skill-sharing badge making workshop to young people at Ashton Vale Club for Young People. Young people also had the opportunity to work towards their Arts Award Bronze and Explore certificates during the project.

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We wish to congratulate all of the young people who have taken part in our creative programmes and look forward to giving others the opportunity to gain their Arts Award in 2022.

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For more information please email the Creative Team on creative@youngbristol.com or call on 0117 929 2513.

Bristol City's Robins Foundation and Young Bristol bring the BS14 X Robins Foundation programme to young people ages 12-19 living in South Bristol.

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The BS14 X Robins Foundation launching Friday 11th February 2022, will bring positive sports activities to young people at BS14 Youth Club. The program will include issue-based discussions, provide opportunities to gain new skills and improve techniques, make new friendships, and explore future opportunities. The program is inclusive and accessible to all.

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Young Bristol looks forward to working with the Robins Foundation, providing sport and learning opportunities to the wider community.

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The weekly program will take place:

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• Every Friday, 6:30pm-8:30pm at BS14 Youth Club, Stockwood Lane, BS14 8SJ

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Interested in joining the program? No need to book, just turn up!

We are delighted to announce the appointment of Andy Kimber, Head of Operations at Young Bristol. 

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The Head of Operations is a new Role that has been created to assist Young Bristol’s expanding team in delivering on its 2022-25 Five Key Strategic Priorities, ensuring YB continues to play a leading and expanding role within Bristol’s Voluntary Sector. 

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Andy Kimber has been involved with young people throughout his career. Always with an interest in sports, he worked with young people all around the world as a snowsports instructor and outdoor activity instructor. He combined this love with youth work for a youth charity affecting positive change in young people using snowsports and life-skills. Andy previously worked for Young Bristol in 2019 as their Youth and Community Lead, before going into teaching for 2 years. He joins us with a passion to help all young people to discover their potential and provide a supportive network for them to thrive.

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This appointment comes at an exciting time – supporting Young Bristol’s developing work with children and young people across Bristol, and will see the Head of Operations play a vital role in ensuring Young Bristol delivers on its 2022-25 Vision, Mission and Strategic Priorities. 

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We hope you will join us in welcoming Andy Kimber to the Young Bristol team!

"You can see how our work continues to change lives; and it is these stories that inspire all of us to do more."

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We are very proud to publish this year's Impact Report for 2020-21, which demonstrates the positive impact Young Bristol are continuing to have on so many children and young people, in and around Bristol.

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This year's Impact Report was launched at our President's Meeting on Wednesday 1st December 2021. The President's Meeting welcomed our staff team, Trustee Board and Vice Presidents to discuss our Impact during 2020-21 and Young Bristol's 2021-24 Strategy development.

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The meeting explored how Young Bristol has consulted with children and young people, our supporters, national bodies and stakeholders, together with the wider community throughout 2021. It is really important for the team at Young Bristol to reflect on how far we have come over the years, helping us to build our future aspirations for the organisation, to be able to respond to future needs and keep young people at the heart of everything that we do.

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Our impact

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*"The way the youth sector has come together, both locally and nationally has shown how we can work together to respond to the needs of young people."

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Young Bristol has been at the core of Bristol’s communities for over 90 years, adapting and evolving when faced with challenges, to ensure that we are there in local communities, providing safe spaces, empowering and inspiring children and young people to overcome and achieve great futures.

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This has been a year unlike any others, as we were faced with the unprecedented challenge of supporting young people during a pandemic and multiple national lockdowns. At a time when we knew that young people desperately needed safe spaces to go to, opportunities to connect with their friends and to try something new; we were not able to open the doors of our clubs and activity programmes for large periods of the year. With that in mind, I am incredibly proud of the way that the Young Bristol team adapted its way of working to continue to meet the needs of young people.

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The effects of the pandemic on young people are significant, but are not new, and have served to highlight the issues of loneliness, wellbeing and poor employment prospects that so many young people across the city were sadly already facing. There are no quick answers to these issues, but we know the preventative value and long term impact of our work, and we remain committed to providing quality open access provision in our local communities.

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Looking to the future, we want to build on what we have learnt from the last year and to invest in our people, facilities and partnerships to meet the increasing demand for our support. With that in mind, I have been really pleased to see the way that the youth sector in Bristol came together through this period and we are looking forward to working as part of the Bristol Voluntary and Community sector (VCS) youth work group to develop and deliver its new strategy.

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As we look ahead, I am pleased to share our 2020 – 21 Impact Report, which demonstrates the passion, drive and commitment of the staff team, trustees, fundraising committee and volunteers behind Young Bristol. Thank you for your fantastic and continued support, and I hope you enjoy reading our impact in this year’s report.

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Jamie Cameron

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CHAIR OF YOUNG BRISTOL

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Our key highlights

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Some of our key highlights from this year’s Impact Report include:

• 2,025 young people supported by our programmes during COVID-19
• 20,492 reached on 69 interactive videos on social media
• 629 face-to-face and online sessions delivered
• 56 qualifications awarded by young people ages 8 – 25
• 16 communities supported across Bristol and the surrounding areas
• 4 new communities received youth provision during 2020 – 21
• The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service was awarded to Young Bristol, the highest award a voluntary group can receive in the UK

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Download our 2020-21 Impact Report

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Designed by Fontology Studio.

New partnership with Redpoint Bristol will see Young Bristol's Outdoor Employment Programme trainees work at the Indoor Climbing Centre!

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Young Bristol's FREE Outdoor Employment Programme is open to young people ages 16 – 25 across Bristol. This scheme supports young people to gain qualifications, meet new friends, and build a future towards a positive employment as an outdoor instructor, with our partnered local outdoor centres.

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Five trainees from our Outdoor Employment Programme have begun their training and work experience at the Indoor Climbing Centre. It is fantastic to be collaborating with local outdoor pursuit centres, supporting our city's young people in gaining access to employment opportunities. A massive thanks to Redpoint Bristol for all their support!

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If you're aged between 16 - 25 and want to get involved with the Outdoor Employment Programme, contact Phil Harris at ph@youngbristol.com. We will be recruiting new trainees in early December!

“There are loads of benefits to working with Young Bristol, in terms of business, as well as culture and morale” – Chris Sheard, founder of SR2 Recruitment.

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Corporate partnerships are important to Young Bristol and aim to be mutually beneficially to the parties involved; encouraging team building, meeting corporate social responsibility objectives, securing positive PR and supporting corporates to reach new audiences. Our partnerships aim to ensure shared value and impact.

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Local business SR2 (Socially Responsible Recruitment) winners of ‘Best New Agency’ at the Recruiter Awards 2020, are a recruitment company founded in 2017 in Bristol, specialising in IT and Engineering recruitment. It is important to SR2 as a business to be socially responsible, contributing to society by prioritising people and giving back to the local community. And so during 2020-21, the company chose Young Bristol to be one of two of SR2’s Charity of the Years. At SR2 it is core to the business to not only support charities and make a difference financially, but to also ensure that there is staff involvement during the partnership, and that the charity they support is in line with their corporate beliefs.

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Young Bristol has been on SR2’s radar because of its great reputation and being in the press as an award winning charity, said Chris, owner of SR2. SR2’s process of selecting a charity partner is always through staff recommendations, ensuring that the team feel connected to the cause they are helping. The ethos of Young Bristol really stood out to SR2 as a children’s charity that is driven in creating opportunities, and being active in helping young people find their potential.

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The proactive and outdoor approach of Young Bristol is also very much in-line with the interests of SR2, as staff can go out and volunteer in the community, which is great in ensuring staff from SR2 can see the difference that their support is having. It is very important to SR2 “to not just write a cheque”, but to be as involved as possible in the charity; and Young Bristol provides multiple opportunities to do so, which results in “ a definite increase in staff engagement”, adds Chris.

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During 2020, SR2 donated over £8,300 to Young Bristol, as well as six members of their team getting involved in Young Bristol’s fundraising event, raising an additional £600! Events like the Road to River Duathlon have been a great way for staff to volunteer and get involved with the charity, so early on in the partnership.

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2021 saw the partnership continue, with SR2 planning to engage with further volunteering opportunities to benefit the local community such as workshops to improve CV writing and employability skills, as well as taking part in a recent fundraising challenge which saw their team cycle virtually from Bristol to Berlin… and back.

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SR2 this week surprised the Young Bristol team, donating £41,716.38 to Young Bristol and Jessie May Trust. This outstanding charitable donation will support Young Bristol's Outdoor Employment Programme and Creative Programme, developing confidence and allowing a safe space for expressive working, and providing young people with new skills, unique opportunities and a direct pathway into employment.

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SR2’s partnership with Young Bristol continues to have a positive impact, with Chris adding, *“Our partnership with Young Bristol feels like a good fit for us and even in the current climate, is a partnership that can grow”. Thank you SR2!