2019 News Archive

Invisible City

In October, as part of their social awareness project exploring the issues of homelessness, Coverdale lads group braved the cold to go on a walking tour with Invisible City Manchester. With tour guide ‘Danny’, sharing his experience of homelessness and his time on the street through moving poetry and humorous anecdotes, the group were prompted to think about the stigma and challenges faced by homeless people and also the work being done to tackle it.

 

The boys said of the tour

‘It’s made me respect them more and have a better understanding’

‘It’s made me have realise the struggles that some people go through’

‘I’ve learnt to never judge people without knowing about them’

Lads Climb to New Heights

In October, the Coverdale Lads Group enjoyed an adventurous trip to the Manchester Climbing Centre. The trip gave the group the opportunity to challenge themselves and to try something new. The group encouraged each other, which gave them confidence to keep going even when it got difficult. Some of the lads managed to overcome their fear of heights and climbed higher with each wall they attempted! Many of them expressed their surprise at how high they had climbed.

Thought-Provoking Theatre

In June and October, Brunswick Girls group visited HOME Theatre in Manchester to see two thought-provoking, funny and moving performances, exploring what it means to be a woman through music, song and dance.

In ‘Girls!’, a diverse cast of women of various ages shared stories celebrating women of different shapes and shades as they sang and danced through their experiences, exploring their relationship with their bodies, family heritage and social expectations.

‘Queens of Sheba’ followed four black women has they took the  audience through everyday occurrences encountering 'misogynoir' (the combination of racism and sexism in discrimination against black women). Using poetic stories, song and dance they gave an insight into what it means to be Black British and a woman, exploring these issues in relationships, the work place and in society as a whole.

The performances opened up conversations with the girls around these issues and they expressed how they were encouraged and inspired by the different types of women performing.

Summer Sports and Summer Club

Our Summer Programmes engage children aged 6-11 years through outdoor fun games, sports and indoor holiday club activities. In the outdoor sessions young people took part in fun team games and playground games such as quick cricket, kickball, dodgeball, bulldog, tig, volleyball and skipping. The indoor holiday club activities comprised board games, den making, softball games, hide and seek, arts and crafts, T-shirt designing, bingo and quizzes. Making and playing with friends is an important part of the club - children expressed their excitement during and at the end of sessions, saying they were going to ‘invite friends’ to the next club. All the activities served to foster a sense of fun, curiosity, imaginative learning and community friendship.

Barbershop Chronicles at The Royal Exchange

In April our young lads' group went to see the ‘Barbershop Chronicles’ at The Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester. The play is set inside an Afro Caribbean barbershop with scenes set in various places across the globe - from Peckham to Johannesburg, Harare, Kampala, Lagos and Accra. The play highlighted issues around politics, family life and fatherhood, masculinity and relationships, whilst still being funny and engaging. It illustrated the social difficulties that particularly affect young black males around these issues, giving us the opportunity to discuss with the lads alternative and positive ways of interacting with these topics. The group expressed how much they had been inspired by the play, with one lad saying that it made him feel “proud to be African”.

 

Lads' Peak District Residential

In March our lads group planned, and took part in, a residential in the Peak District for 3 days and 2 nights. The aim of the residential was to get out of the city, into the countryside and to try new activities to benefit their mental health and help them to manage tehir stress and anxiety. During the trip the lads went caving, cycling, canoeing and did a night hike.  The time away also gave them an opportunity to reflect on their feelings and to explore how, as they move towards adulthood, they can deal with them and take appropriate action when necessary..

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