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Volunteering
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Mentoring
We’re looking for people with 2-3 hours a week to dedicate to a young person for a minimum of two years, and people to help out with our activities on an ad-hoc basis. You don’t need experience with youth work, we’re looking for kind and non-judgemental people with time to give to improve someone else’s life.
Click on ‘Get in touch’, and you’ll contacted by a member of the team to organise a chat so we can link you to the right project.
You’ll be invited to an information evening where you get the chance to hear from the team and existing volunteers to make sure this is the right opportunity for you, and onto our 8 week training programme, (one evening a week). You’ll will learn about what it’s like to grow up in care, how to be a mentor, what skills and qualities you can bring to the relationship. We describe our training as experiential, with many volunteers telling us they know more about themselves after completing the training.
You’ll also be required to complete a DBS check and provide 2 references stating your suitability to work with young people.
After training you’ll be carefully matched to a young person from your local community. We provide lots of support for your relationship to flourish with many turning into long term friendships. You’ll also feel supported by our existing network of volunteers, we have a range of talents and experiences to
to share with each other so you will certainly feel part of something bigger. We refer to this network as the Pure Insight Family, everyone mucks in to support each other. You’ll receive ongoing support and supervision for the 2 years you are on the programme, after that its left to you and the young person to decide if you would like to continue to see each other on terms that suit you both.
Activities volunteering
Some people can’t commit to a two year relationship, or they want to dip their toes in this area, and choose to join us as activities volunteers. We’d welcome your interest in this area too, as it’s loads of fun, but our activities also a vital part of building up experiences, soft skills, managing risk, relationship building and challenge in our young people who don't have the benefit of experiences other young people have. It's also brilliant for overall resilience and mental health, so if you might be interested, let us know by using the ‘get in touch’ form.
We’ll need to DBS check, follow up references, and train you, but as the role isn’t so in depth, neither is the training – but still impactful and relevant.
What is Mentoring?
- Somebody just for me –
Volunteer mentors are long term champions in a young person’s life, they support young people to flourish and be the best versions of themselves.
Our mentoring service is a tailored 1:1 offer to a young person, providing practical and emotional support for a minimum of 2 years.
The support is led by the young person and most of our mentoring relationships turn into long term friendships. Everyone needs someone in their corner, mentors very quickly become a valued and consistent champion and or friend in the young persons life
Volunteer mentors are recruited from the community and extensively trained over a 10 week period. They provide practical and emotional support around a range of issues faced by young people, are a friendly ally to turn to in times of need and someone to share your good news with . Using a relationship based approach mentors are also joined together in peer support groups forming a pool of local knowledge, skills and experience. Young people also support the mentor to be the best version of themselves, many of our volunteers share how life changing the experience has been for them.
