Can you make a difference to a young person's life? We urgently require volunteers to befriend a child or young person living in care who has little or no contact with their birth-family.
We work with 7 local authorities: Newcastle, North Tyneside, South Tyneside, Northumberland, Gateshead, Sunderland, Durham, but also placements in Darlington and Stockton.
We support young people if they are living in Residential and foster homes.
We are looking for enthusiastic and reliable volunteers to act as an Independent Visitor (Volunteer) for a young person they are matched up with. This will include:
. Fortnightly or monthly contact with a child or young person providing emotional and practical
support where appropriate, completing evaluation and finance forms for each visit.
. As an Action for Children Volunteer you would get an induction into the work with Action for
Children, training, supervision, support and reimbursement of reasonable expenses.
If you feel that you have up to 4 hours per month to spare and would like to make a difference in a child’s life, then please let us know as soon as possible.
Visit their young person up to twice a month.
Taking them out and helping him/her to engage in new experiences, share interests and generally have fun together. They may go to the cinema, a football match, shopping or eat out. Support them at meetings if the young person request, support will be given.
No skills required as training is offered.
Reliability and commitment are essential qualities - some 'looked after' young people do not have a consistent adult figure in their lives and Independent Visitors often fulfil this role.
Depending on address of the young people it is preferable for the volunteer to have their own car as travelling is involved, however not a necessity.
So long as you are over 18, have a sense of humour, are patient, tolerant and a good listener then this may be for you!
Independent Visitor Scheme, Wesley House, Bond Street, Benwell, Newcastle, NE4 8BA
The volunteers are offered on-going support through 1-1 supervision and Support groups meetings every quarter.
Ongoing and online training within the service
All out of pocket expenses and mileage is paid, in line with the local authority agreements.
Support in the application for a DBS and Reference checks
Funding for certain activities
Action for Children recently have been awarded the Investors in Volunteers accreditation which is the UK quality standard for good practice in volunteer management.
There are a number of benefits that volunteers can access such as:
Access to the online training lounge.
Constructive Supervision
Discounts and Benefit portal
Additional Training courses
Access internal vacancies
Well-being workshops
Stephenson’s awards, this is a dedicated award for the most outstanding volunteer.
Action for Children Roads shows
Age is not an issue but as we work with young people age from 8 to 21 so we are looking for volunteers from 20+
