Education & Social Support Projects


Education and support project funding

  • One to one long term mentoring project with Trelya in Cornwall
  • Mental health support for young people with Young Minds
  • Support for teenage young carers with Edinburgh Young Carers
  • Surf Therapy courses for children and young people with The Wave Project
  • Respite and activity break with Go Beyond
  • Psycho-social support for families with West London Action for Children
  • Cross-community relationship building initiative at Holy Cross Nursery in Belfast with CRIS
  • Respite break and skills building training with Fife Young Carers
  • Funding for at home counselling services provided by SeeSaw child bereavement charity
  • One to one reading support and mentoring with Beanstalk 

Trelya

Trelya, the Cornish language word for ‘change’, was founded in 2001. Trelya believes that high quality, proactive, preventative work can make an incredible difference to the futures of very disadvantaged children. The project is based on the proven success of the Friends of the Children programme which originated 25 years ago in the USA. Using innovative, creative, sustained methods, specifically through a secure one to one mentor, Trelya supports individual children and their families in West Cornwall. 

Trelya’s professionally-trained youth workers dedicate themselves to helping children break the cycle of social exclusion by providing consistent support and a safe place to come. Evidence confirms that very disadvantaged children who receive consistent care and love from an adult who stays with them for the long term will benefit from life-changing improvements and new better outcomes.

We have funded part of the "Realising Ambition" mentoring project as well as funding work with pre-school age children attending the Skylar nursery provision. 

Fife Young Carers

Fife Young Carers has been supporting young carers aged 8 - 25 for over twenty years. Young carers look after family members with problems such as long-term illness, mental health challenges, substance misuse and physical or learning disabilities. Young carers are faced with a wide range of demanding tasks: managing money, ensuring there is adequate medical care, offering emotional support, providing practical help with domestic chores and caring for younger siblings. Through this young carers may face their own challenges: bullying, social exclusion, poor educational attainment, financial difficulties, along with personal anxiety and low self-esteem. 

Working alongside agencies and organisations such as Fife Council and the Carers Trust, Fife Young Carers aims to provide every carer with the same opportunities and experiences enjoyed by their peers. Through workshops, residential courses, day trips and one-to-one sessions, carers are supported with their mental and physical well-being as well as given practical support with the day to day issues they face. Fife Young Carers offers one-to-one support sessions, group programmes, skill-based workshops and information and advice events. 

In 2019 The George Oliver Foundation funded part of a three-day residential training programme for 12 young carers aged 14 to 18 entitled 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens. The programme aims to teach key skills such as taking responsibility, thinking positively, communicating clearly, and looking after one’s own health as well as caring for another person. Well over three-quarters of the young adult carers who attended reported increased confidence and improved support, and over 90% of them said they felt better able to cope with their caring roles. Above all, individuals who have taken the course find themselves better empowered to take control of their lives and to activate solutions to their problems.

SeeSaw

SeeSaw is Oxfordshire's child bereavement charity. SeeSaw has been working with children and young people in Oxfordshire since 2000. They provide a pioneering service working with families when a parent is dying as well as providing support to bereaved children in all circumstances following the death of a family member. Through appropriate and timely support, SeeSaw can help to reduce the emotional, psychological and mental health consequences of bereavement. Young people are then able to face the future with hope.

The George Oliver Foundation provided funding for SeeSaw's Volunteer Support Works Project to ensure that children are supported, at home, as much as they need. SeeSaw provide counselling and support, out of school hours, and at home for as long as needed. This important work tries to ensure that children and young people are equipped with the tools they need to deal with the emotional, psychological and mental health problems that can arise following a childhood bereavement. SeeSaw also works to offer telephone consultations, professional training and family events and activity days.
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