# **Before Becoming a Parent (B4BP) charity 1180821** 

# **Before Becoming a Parent (B4BP) Charity 1180821** 

## **Annual Report, 1[st] April 2023 to 31[st] March 2024** 

## **Our mission** 

Our charity has continued its mission to prepare children and young people at school and in other settings to become good parents in future,  and  also  to  support  parents  of  young  children  who  are struggling to be ’good enough’ parents in the present. 

## **Our experience** 

We have built upon our experience over several years of delivering lessons in primary and secondary schools which aimed to increase students’ knowledge and empathy concerning the emotional aspects of parenthood. We ran Baby Watching in primary schools, and sessions in secondary schools where we brought in a variety of parents and babies to be observed and spoken to, plus teenage parents to explain their situation, and we used drama techniques to make the material come alive even further. We lent ‘virtual babies’ to students to take home for the weekend. 

## **Our dissemination** 

Having seen the popularity and benefits of this work, we decided to take it much further by producing a comprehensive guide for school staff  in  any  part  of  the  world,  and  therefore  spent  some  years researching  and  writing  our  two-volume  book **Nothing  More Important** .  Volume  One  was  completed  and  published  by  April 2024, with a view to completing Volume Two in the following year. 

## **Help to parents of children** 

We used our grant, received in December 2022 from Awards for All, to fund ‘Friday Fun for All’ after school sessions in the building of the Toy Library in Leytonstone, East London. This was to assist families who were stressed, partly because of the demands of homework. It was  designed  as  a  venue  where  children  and  teenagers  could complete their homework, with support, in time for the weekend. As we predicted, it became an invaluable opportunity for parents to gain support with various issues related to their role as parents. The sessions were staffed by workers with experience of delivering play therapy and other types of help to parents and children. 

## **The future** 

There were discussions about setting up an All Party Parliamentary Group  about  school-based  preparation  for  parenthood,  once  the book has been distributed in future years. 



## **B4BP Annual Accounts 1[st] April 2023 – 31st March 2024** 

Bank balance at 31 3 23                     £11,388  86 (comprising Awards for All grant £9,500) 

## **Income** 


**----- Start of picture text -----**<br>
  £<br>**----- End of picture text -----**<br>



**----- Start of picture text -----**<br>
0<br>**----- End of picture text -----**<br>



**----- Start of picture text -----**<br>
Expenditure    £<br>Publicity 517  00<br>Room Hire        2,205  00<br>DBS checks           101  60<br>Staff fees        1,180  00<br>Training    24  00<br>Food                                                               416  48<br>Total expenditure:                                 £4,444  08<br>**----- End of picture text -----**<br>


Bank balance at 31 3 24                          £6,944  78 

Signed: Carol Spence, Chair 


January 13[th] 2025