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2023-03-31-annual-report

St Teresa’s Youth Centre

Trustees Report 2022/23

NIC101561

Trustees' Annual Report Year ended 31 March 2023

The trustees of St Teresa’s Youth Centre present their report and financial statements of the charity for the year ended 31 March 2023.

Reference and administrative details

Registered charity name : St Teresa’s Youth Centre

Charity registration number: NIC101561

Principal office: St Teresa’s Youth Centre, 131a Glen Road, Belfast, BT118BL

The Trustees – At time of writing Trustee report

Mr Seamus Campbell (Chairperson)

Mr Joseph McPartland (Vice Chairperson )

Mr Ciaran Kennedy (Secretary)

Ms Bridget Bradley(Treasurer)

Mrs Natalie Press (Vice Secretary)

Mr Ronan McLaughlin

Mr Martin McCaughan

Very Rev Fr Gabriel Lyons

Independent examiner

Muir and Addy Chartered Accountants

427 Holywood Road Belfast BT4 2LT

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Chairperson’s Foreword

Over the past 12 months St Teresa’s Youth Centre has been faced with many challenges but despite this we have continued to provide high quality youth provision to the young people of the Glen Road and much further afield and it is my privilege to report on these great triumphs. The successes detailed within this report were made possible due to the continuing support from the staff team, our young people and stakeholders.

The recent cuts in funding from the Education Authority and uncertainty in relation to the core budget made it challenging to implement a long term plan. This uncertainty brought increased pressures and stress on our staff team and our young people. The response from the local community in relation to the proposed reduction in our services highlighted the need for our work and the role that we play in the lives of our young people, their families and the entire community.

This year, similar to recent years the main priority and underlying theme throughout all of our projects, activities, events etc was improving levels of health and well-being amongst our young people. We continued to deliver quality programmes to our young people in centre and reach out those young people within our community who were deemed as ‘at risk’ via outreach and detached youth work.

St Teresa’s Youth Centre is a vital cog within the Glen Road/ Andersonstown community that has become an asset for all to use. Our work within the community is visible for all to see and we are often a first point of contact for many young people, parents and other voluntary and statutory organisations who require additional support.

To everyone involved in making St Teresa’s the success that it is, the Management Committee would like to convey our sincere thanks to you all. We send our thanks to those funders who provide us with the necessary grants to create opportunities for our young people, to our partner organisations and those who support our work; none of what we do would be possible without you all.

To our staff team who worked tirelessly throughout the year to support our young people, they give so much time and commitment and we give you a special word of thanks because without you none of the above listed could have been achieved.

We, as a Management Committee will continue to work under the guidance of Department of Education, the Education Authority, the Charity Commission for Northern Ireland and other statutory organisations to ensure that our beneficiaries continue to receive a high quality service and remain safe and compliant in all aspects of our work.

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Thank you

Seamus Campbell

Chairperson

The Management Committee

Overview of Youth Centre (purpose & main activities )

The Youth Centre’s mission is: “To support our children and young people in all aspects of life and provide opportunities to enable them to meet their educational, social, political, spiritual, personal, cultural and physical needs.”

St. Teresa’s Youth Centre is the only full-time voluntary Parish based youth provider, which for over fifty years has been providing a service for the young people of the parish of St. Teresa’s and from much further afield. The centre is located in an area of high deprivation and is in one of the top 10% most deprived electoral wards within Northern Ireland.

The underlying ethos of our Centre is the personal, social and spiritual development of young people and the promotion of empowerment, acceptance and understanding of others, capacity building and social action.

The Youth Centre was formed in 1973, initially operating in two mobile huts situated in the grounds of the primary school and the use of the school’s sports hall. Building on the Youth Centre on this site began in 1976 and the centre was officially opened on November 5[th] 1978.

Since then our Youth Centre has established itself as a Centre of Excellence in the provision of aesthetic and creative activities and martial arts. The Centre boasts the provision of Ballet Classes, Irish dancing Classes and Karate Classes.

St. Teresa’s Youth Centre currently works with approximately 400+ young people, between the ages of 5-25 years. Our current staff team consists of 1x full-time Senior Youth Worker, 1 x 30hr youth support project worker,1 x 18hr building supervisor, 1 x 16hr administrator and 8-part time youth support workers funded by the Education Authority. The youth centre also has 1 x full time Young Women’s participation worker funded by BBC Children In Need and a bank of volunteers and specialist instructors who staff the Centre and facilitate a range of programmes and projects.

The staff team, with the help and support of the Management Committee, work tirelessly to meet the ever-changing needs of the Centre’s members and the community. This year we

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continued to focus on our role within the community and build upon work carried out within the previous year to ensure as many young people as possible had access to our services.

We continue to implement the Youth Centres Service Level Agreement Plan. This plan strategically meets the needs of the young people and was formed using information that has been identified in the E.A West Belfast Area Plan. The implementation of the new quality assurance system (M.I.S as funded via E.A) within the centre last year allowed us to effectively monitor and evaluate our work and was very beneficial to the staff team as this has enabled us to ensure that the needs and wants of our membership are met and that the quality of our work is to a high standard.

Objectives of St Teresa’s Youth Centre

In the furtherance of St Teresa’s Youth Centre’s charitable objectives, but not further or otherwise, the centre may:

 Provide, maintain and equip premises and facilitation for social, spiritual, educational and recreational activities therein;

 Organise or assist in organising events and activities consistent with the objects of the centre;

 Co-operate, to such an extent as may be necessary, with voluntary and statutory agencies and the inhabitants of the area of benefit so as to advance the said objectives;

 Raise funds and invite or receive contributions from any person or persons whatsoever by way of subscription, donation or otherwise provided that this shall not permit or entitle the centre to engage in permanent trading;

 Do all such other lawful things as may be necessary to the attainment of the above objectives.

St Teresa’s Youth Centre is overseen and managed daily by a Senior Youth Worker. The administrative and finances are overseen by the administrator and the board of trustees. We have a team of full and part-time youth work staff both qualified and voluntary. The team operate a daily programme of developmental and educational activities. The Centre has a service level agreement with the Education Authority and several grant contracts with different funding bodies for the servicing of young people’s needs within the Glen Road area.

Board of Trustees

Governing document & Constitution

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St Teresa’s Youth Centre’s board of trustees is formed of a group of skilled individuals who have a clear understanding of the aims & objectives of the centre. They are aware of our role as a charitable organisation and have vested interest in the centre. They are dedicated to seeing the centre reach its full potential and are keen to support our Senior worker and staff team in ensuring this happens. The trustees work to the ethos of the centre and value the commitment and work of all stakeholders. The trustees understand our role in relation to governance and have attended a number of training courses to ensure we are equipped with the necessary skills and knowledge to make informed decisions and guide the organisation to the best of our ability.

The Youth Centre constitution is the document that guides us in our role as trustees, it enables us to have a clear understanding of our role within the organisation and ensures that stakeholders and funders are aware that we are a democratic and accountable organisation. The trustees gain no financial benefit for their association with the organisation. The trustees are aware of their responsibility to report annually to the Charity Commission.

The Trustees ensure that all Youth Centre policies and procedures are adhered to by the members and the entire staff team. These are regularly reviewed and updated to reflect the introduction of new or changing government legislation.

The trustees hold an AGM each year where members are elected into position. This is an opportunity for others who wish to join the board to express an interest. They are then invited to take part in the application process in keeping with the Youth Centres policies and procedures in relation to selection of trustees.

The trustees of St Teresa’s Youth Centre from (April 2022-March 2023) were:

 Edward Haughey (Chair) – E. Haughey resigned from position as Chair in October 2023 with Seamus Campbell taking up this position

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Organisational flow chart

Staffing

St Teresa’s Youth Centre currently employs:

1x full time senior youth worker

1x full time young women’s worker

1x 30hr youth support project worker

1 x 16 hr administrator

1 x 18hr building supervisor

8 x part time youth workers

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2 x volunteers

Throughout the course of the year the staff team have continued to excel and are the most valuable asset to the centre. They availed of various training opportunities throughout the year to ensure we delivered effective provision and the needs of our members were met. The result of this training is that we now have a more competent and confident team of youth workers.

Throughout 22/23 members of the staff team completed:

*Child protection & safeguarding training

*First Aid Training

*Monthly staff meetings

We will continue to seek out training courses relevant to the professional development of the staff team and which will ensure the staff team are equipped with the skills and knowledge to work effectively with our young people.

Funding

All of the grants awarded to the centre this year were vital in ensuring that our staff team were able to meet the ever-changing needs of our young people and the local community. All returns were submitted on time, to a high standard and with no queries from any funders. Our quarterly and annual financial moderations from the EA were completed without issue or concern.

Education Authority ( EA)

The Education Authority youth service were once again the biggest funder of our work and it is imperative that they continue to fund this on- going work to enable us to engage the young people from the parish and much further afield. The EA once again funded the majority of our staffing costs – the biggest financial outlay we have. In addition to this funding for

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salaries, the Education Authority have also provided us with some assistance towards the cost of overheads, targeted programme work and resources.

BBC Children In Need

BBC Children in Need continued to fund the salary of a Young Women’s Participation Worker until January 2025.

Programme/Project Grants

We applied to a number of other agencies throughout the year including Belfast City Council, Youth Justice Agency, Henry Smith Foundation, Halifax & the Education Authority who awarded us funding to deliver targeted programme work. These grants were vital in ensuring that we continued to engage with our young people and continue to provide much needed resources, support, guidance and education.

Belfast City Council

Belfast City council awarded the centre with a grant to deliver a sports based programme . Education Authority M.I.S grant

We were successful in our application to the EA – M.I.S grant which enabled the centre to purchase an online information system to record our work online. As part of this funding we also received vital training on how to operate the new MIS system. This will complement our own ‘’in house’ quality assurance systems and comply with EA expectations.

Halifax grant

The Halifax foundation awarded us a grant to deliver accredited programmes and out of centre trips for our senior members.

Henry Smith Foundation

We were successful in our application to the Henry Smith foundation who awarded the centre funding to deliver a summer programme for our intermediate members during July/August.

Education Authority- Outreach/Detached youth work

We were part of a collaborative bid to the EA (with 3 other youth providers within the community ) to secure funding to deliver Outreach/detached work within our community .

We are extremely thankful for the grants, help and support from all of our funders which contributes so much to our programme on offer.

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Quality Assurance

All of our work is quality assured to ensure we are meeting the needs of our young people and the aims and objectives of the centre. Our quality assurance systems help us to identify areas of improvements, specific needs of membership and the overall quality of our provision. Our system records attendance, meetings, sessional evaluations, programme work and enables us to track the progress of individual members and the centre against our outcomes and the EA outcomes framework.

Youth Centre Annual membership review 2022/2023

Annual membership and sessional attendee numbers remained consistent throughout the year having increased significantly the previous year. Our online support was noticeably reduced due to the increase in numbers of young people attending the centre and receiving face to face support. We anticipated this post covid and are happy that levels of isolation amongst our young people have reduced and they feel comfortable and confident to return to centre and avail of face to face provision. We continued to provide online support and engage with those small number of young people who remained in isolation or felt uncomfortable to return to the centre.

We seen an increase in the numbers of young people seeking support in relation to their health and well-being. Most notably, there was an increase in the numbers of young people aged 14-18 years seeking support in relation to their mental health. Many of these young people were keen to partake in workshops and programmes around the themes of resilience, stress management and effective communication. We continued to work with outside agencies and make referrals or signpost our young people to specialist services who were best placed to meet their needs. We continued to spend a significant amount of time providing 1-2-1 support for our young people who expressed feelings of stress, depression, hopelessness and anxiety. We continued to work with the vulnerable and excluded within our communities as per the directive within the priorities for youth policy.

A needs analysis carried out at the beginning of the year helped centre staff to identify needs of our membership and equipped us with the information to plan our programme for

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the year ensuring our work is effective. The main areas of focus as identified through our consultations were: the development of accredited programmes, mental health awareness, drug and alcohol awareness, educational support, need for more programmes with international residential opportunities, money management and physical health and well-being. As the year progressed we seen the impacts of the cost of living crisis on our young people and the entire community. We seen an increase in the numbers of young people expressing feelings of hunger and concerns in relation to financial hardship for their families. As a result of the above we developed partnerships with Lidl & Tesco who provide us with food donations each week as part of the ‘food cloud’ programme . This has been a vital resource for the centre and our young people.

Our homework support sessions continued throughout the year and attracted high numbers. Our homework support sessions ran Monday-Friday from 2.30-5.00pm upon request from young people and their parents. We seen an increase in demand for this programme from parents who were experiencing difficulty in meeting homework requirements and finding affordable afterschool provision for their children. Due to staff-young person ratio we had to cap our numbers for this programme and developed a ‘waiting list’. Members of our senior member volunteer group support our staff team during homework support sessions. We further developed our working relationships with local primary and secondary schools to ensure the educational needs of our members were met and that they had access to any additional resources and information they required.

The demands placed on our provision were greater than ever and the need for our service was very clear to be seen. As a result, we were continuously reviewing and adapting our programme to meet the changing needs and wants of our membership.

Youth Centre Programmes, Achievements & Annual performance

St Teresa’s Youth Centre facilitated a range of programmes for our young people throughout the year. These programmes ranged from accredited courses, detached and street based youth work, gender based personal development programmes, 1-2-1 support sessions, outdoor education, health and well-being programmes with a focus on physical and mental health awareness, cookery programmes, outdoor residential visits, drama workshops, international residential to Berlin, partnership programmes with other youth providers, inclusion programmes and healthy eating initiatives. All programmes, activities and events were in keeping with the aims/objectives as outlined in the EA area plan for West Belfast

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Outreach/ Detached/Street based work

Outreach/detached/street based youth work was facilitated by members of staff team throughout the year. We continued to deploy workers onto the streets, in particular at times of heightened tension within the community or when there are likely to be increased levels of anti-social behaviour amongst young people (weekends, St Patrick’s day, Halloween etc). Our outreach team educated our young people on making positive choices and ways to actively contribute to their community. We worked in collaboration with the PSNI, Belfast City Council and other youth providers to deliver effective street based youth work. This work has been instrumental in ensuring that our young people remain safe within our community.

Residential Experiences /International visit

We facilitated several residential experiences for our members this year as part of our outdoor education initiatives which our members thoroughly enjoyed. These residential visits/ diversionary activities were delivered at weekends and at known periods of heightened tensions within our community which ensured that those deemed ‘at risk’ of partaking in anti-social behaviour and entering the youth justice system were instead gaining new skills and making positive choices.

As part of our ‘Progression for peace programme’ we facilitated an educational visit to Berlin, Germany. Participants of the programme were exploring barriers and conflict within communities, conflict resolution and comparing and contrasting the peace walls within Berlin and Belfast. Whilst in Berlin group participants visited the remains of the Berlin wall, Sachsenhausen concentration camp , the T.V tower , city tour , East Side gallery and Checkpoint Charlie etc. This was an incredible learning opportunity for group members who thoroughly enjoyed every aspect of this visit.

Despite the various challenges, our programme on offer continued to be delivered to a high standard, our developmental programmes, accredited and non-accredited courses and generic sessions were well attended and enjoyed by all. The EA carried out a number of moderations throughout the year with the centre scoring outstanding on all visits.

Summer provision

The Youth Centre delivered a 4 week summer programme for primary school aged children and an 8 week summer programme for those young people in secondary school. These programmes consisted of in centre activities and a range of our of centre trips.

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Fundraising

The centre hosted a series of fundraising activities for BBC CIN and a number of events to fund the ‘Peer train for community gain’ group educational visit to Berlin.

Financial review

The senior worker, staff team and members of the committee ensured that the Youth Centres financial policies and procedures were adhered to throughout the period 22/23. For detail in relation to finances of the Youth Centre for the period 22/23 please see income and expenditure sections as detailed in financial report.

For the period 23/24 we will endeavour to build upon our reserve of funds, we currently hold 4 months reserve of operational expenditure. We would hope to maintain or build upon this in the coming year.

Conclusion

St. Teresa’s Youth Centre once again continued to serve the Glen Road/Andersonstown community and has made a significant impact upon the lives of our young people. The Youth Centre provides a safe space for our children and young people to engage with peers, learn new skills and make positive impacts on the community.

Despite the continuing obstacles as a result of cuts in funding and the competitive processes to secure grants we were still able to meet the identified needs of our membership and deliver high quality provision throughout 22/23.

We anticipate further obstacles in the coming year, however the greatest asset that St Teresa’s Youth Centre has is its staff team who will no doubt continue to overcome any obstacles and support our young people and our community to the best of their ability.

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