Youth Wellbeing Hub
In August 2022 ESCV launched the Youth Wellbeing Hub to showcase young people’s experiences of mental health and wellbeing in East Sussex Schools.
From March to October 2021 ESCV ran the Youth Inspect and Advise Group (IAG) funded by #iWill via Sussex Community Foundation. The IAG was a young people’s voice forum bringing together young mental health service-users with activism and youth participation methods to initiate change. The project was led, organised, overseen, and championed by young people.
The project included 14 young volunteers from a wide range of schools, colleges and youth groups carrying out issue-based campaigns with a key focus on emotional wellbeing. The group worked with partners to develop youth-led approaches to mental health support, to enhance the welfare and pastoral experience of children and young students in our county.
The Youth Wellbeing Hub is a result of the project and collates young people’s thoughts on Mental Health and Emotional Wellbeing. The resources are a series of different reports, infographics and documents for anyone who works with young people and can be used to ensure that the voice of young people are at the heart of decision making.
To find out more about the impacts of the Youth Inspect & Advise Group on local services, local children and young people and on ESCV, please read our end-of-project report here.
Using Social Media and Wellbeing
This report is an interactive resource to aid and guide a youth-led discussion in the classroom about the role of social media, and it’s positives and negatives.
This report is about embedding mental health into the culture of your education and youth setting, put together from young people who’ve observed a variety of initiatives within their own settings and noted ways to meet best practice when spreading awareness and destigmatizing children and young people’s mental health & emotional wellbeing (MHEW).
This report provides teaching and learning tips around mental health & wellbeing, put together based on the advice and recommendations of our 14 young volunteers at the IAG. Among other things, this report covers PSHE, Life-learning and how to incorporate mental health into the curriculum.
This report was put together based on the advice and recommendations of our young volunteers, about how to support students during their years 6-7 transition period.
This poster summarises a collaborative discussion that we had with young people, on the recommendations for how teachers should best respond to bullying in school environments.
As the Youth Inspect & Advise Group, as well as creating the Youth Wellbeing Hub, we carried out three pieces of targeted work in partnership with four schools. Below you can find information about these projects and what we delivered.
Developing a Whole School Approach
Our first major School Wellbeing project worked in proud partnership with Seaford Head School (SHS). Our volunteers spent five weeks working with
Seaford Head to carry out the following activities, all themes around key aspects of The Whole School Approach:
- Workshops to investigate and advise on the promotion and accessibility of Mental Health services within SHS
- 5 Youth Voice meetings to provide recommendations on PSHE/RSHE and Tutor Time, Exam Stress, Anti-Bullying,
- LGBTQ+ Support and student leadership provisions
- A School Community Survey for Seaford Head students to share their thoughts on the above topics
We provided Seaford Head with 5 reports to underpin future decisions, policies and practices with young people’s ideas and voices.
Inspiring Student Leaders to Prevent Bullying
Our second School Wellbeing project followed swiftly, in an exciting partnership with The Hastings Academy. We spent four weeks working with Hastings, with a particular focus on bullying prevention using Student Leaders/Ambassadors.
We discussed and explored:
- Prevalence of bullying, trends in bullying, and how variations in bullying occur as young people progress through their school careers (such as a rise in cyber bullying and sexual harassment)
- Investigation of The Hastings Academy’s online provisions around bullying prevention
- Guide to Policy-Making for Bullying Prevention
- The development, roles & responsibilities and reward & recognition for Anti-Bullying Ambassadors in The Hastings Academy
We have provided The Hastings Academy with a report which collates our guidance for the academy going forward.
Designing Wellbeing Services for Children and Families
Our third School Wellbeing Project worked in partnership with another project delivered by East Sussex Community Voice – It Takes a Village to Raise a Child (VRAC).
Our young volunteers were approached by VRAC to input into the planning of the projects Frontline Wellbeing Teams.
We provided two reports to the VRAC staff team in order to incorporate our volunteers’ feedback into this service.
VRAC also provided a chance for the IAG Project Leader and three IAG young volunteers to receive training in the Empowerment Approach. This was a great opportunity for IAG to learn more about educational psychology, neuroscience, coaching and meeting best practice when working with other young people.
Work with ESCV
Let’s chat about your project
If you have a project in mind, or are interested in one of our existing projects – please get in touch.