Rooted in Summer enriches the spirit as green thumbs unite, tending to plots that yield not just fresh crops but newfound friendships and purpose.
The number of young people facing challenges around mental health is increasing at a concerning rate. Within Bradford itself schools services and other organisations support-ing young people are severely stretched and the need for mental health provision is rising. Well Beth and Jenny are passionate about utilising the therapeutic benefits of the outdoors to support young people, so they decided to start offering unique, bold and impactful programmesthat looked to tackle this problem.
Rooted is a “new, dynamic and ambitious project that seeks to support, equip and encourage teenage girls. Through tool based and relational learning they create conditions for growth, seeking to combine nature and nurture to bring about long-lasting change for the young women they work with”.
Beth from Rooted explained a little about the importance of this work.
“This project is an effective and successful early intervention programme that seeks to offer support to those young girls who are showing early signs of poor mental health. The demand for programmes such as these that work to alleviate the pressure on other services is great. Working in inner city Secondary Schools within Bradford our cohorts are mostly made up of students who are known to other outside agencies. We know that young people from these communities require focused support that raises their sense of self value and potential. The unique combination of this therapeutic, psycho-educational course provides them with contact with the natural environment, life skills to help them at school and at home and give them hope for the future.”
They are now looking to pilot a new woodland based Summer course that builds on the work they have been doing, which the Alpkit Foundation is pleased to be helping support. Running during the Summer holidays it will offer girls space to learn effective strategies that help develop good mental health and wellbeing. By utilising the powerful benefits of the natural environment, each restorative session works to reduce the experience of negative emotions and increase a sense of self-worth.
“Our hope to extend our provision to offer courses on a referral basis will see us create 3-5 day programmes during the school holidays and we are excited to be planning our first Rooted camp for girls this Summer 2019, which will provide a week of all the different elements that make Rooted so impactful and important.”