By Jess Clarke, Project Manager
As a community Organiser I worked in Canklow for 2 years, in this time I supported a team of community leaders and volunteers in forming the community group ‘Canklow Rainbow Kids Club’. In 2018 the group developed and became self sustainable and needed only minimal support from me.
Over the last year the group have found the need in Canklow to be extremely high but with little engagement from other community members. Because of this and personal circumstances /opposing ideas two group members left this group in order to form a new group which focuses on younger children and the older generation. This new group is called ‘Canklow Kidz’.
the last few months I have supported Canklow Kidz to form and develop their ideas into action. This has included forming a committee, opening a bank account, insurance, fundraising, listening to their community and developing new ideas.
Most recently, the group members have carried out their training in food hygiene, first aid and our community organiser courses. They have already made links with the school and other organisations and are currently working on an after school project with Casting Innovations, allowing younger children to attend tin recycling workshops to create art of their choice.
They have held several children’s art sessions during the last 3 months with Castings as shown here:
The group is slowly fundraising for their ideas by holding online raffles, prizes and activities on Facebook. They have so far managed to pay for their planned Christmas event including room hire, costume hire, and DJ which is a great achievement in only 4 months, around £400 has been raised.
The group have been very proactive in ensuring they have good governance in place to run the group correctly, they have just recently created paperwork for activities themselves, including media consent, accident slips, and sign in sheets. Recently I sat down with the Chair to fill out a funding bid and saw a massive change in the ideas and confidence the group members have now from when I first met them. Initially I would have to guide the group in writing the funding bids, but at the last meeting I was able to just type as they spoke to me in order to submit the form. The planning and organisation the group are carrying out is a great improvement, and I feel this is a massive achievement from the heavy support firstly needed when I met them as volunteers in their community.