The Leicestershire & Rutland Red Cross is appealing to all pubs and clubs etc. who think that they can take up the challenge and raise £200 to buy a wheelchair for the British Red Cross Medical Loans service.

“We are hoping to raise £20,000 for the Area so that we can buy 100 wheelchairs” explains Helen Lee Smith, Area Fundraising Manager. “It’s a tremendous opportunity to raise vital funds to enable us to provide medical equipment to the public in need of short-term loans across the area.”

Each wheelchair has the possibility of being used for 10 years, with careful maintenance issued by the staff and volunteers at the Red Cross. Every wheelchair will be capable of helping 100 people cope whilst they are ill and enable them to continue to be mobile and self-sufficient.

If you would like to help in this campaign or in any way, please contact Laura Harden on 0845 054 7171 or lharden@redcross.org.uk who will be happy to send you a fundraising pack with details on how you can help.

Laura Harden

Loughborough Mela Council is proud to announce that after the success of last year’s Mela we are in a position to hold the event again this year. The Mela last year attracted over 1000 people, with the majority of visitors saying they had a great day and that it should be held again next year.

The Mela Council has met twice at John Storer House, and has proposed the date of the event to be 2nd September 2007, again in Southfields Park.
The theme of the Mela last year was “People in Harmony” and members at a recent meeting agreed to adopt this as a vision for the Mela for years to come.

The group invites people from the local community groups and individuals who are interested in helping organise this year’s event to contact either Amar Bashir or Varsha Parmar on 01509 261651 or e-mail crec@btconnect.com

The Mela is a fantastic opportunity for all people, young and old, to highlight and celebrate the cultural diversity of Loughborough. All the different communities of the Borough and surrounding County can come together to showcase really positive images of their cultures, as well as share and learn from others.

Amar Bashir, Chair of the Mela Committee said:
“The success of last year Mela could have only been achieved through the hard work of individuals, communities and partner organisations. We want the Mela to be a community event and so anybody who wishes to contribute is more than welcome to contact us on the above details.

Let’s make this year’s Mela bigger and better and most importantly - have lots of fun”
For update progress and information, please go onto the Charnwood Racial Equality Council website at www.charnwoodrec.org.

Amar Bashir

RNIB East Midlands and East is your local gateway to RNIB services for blind and partially sighted people, families, carers and the professionals who work with them.

Our aim is to work to ensure that people who are blind or partially sighted enjoy the same rights, responsibilities, opportunities and quality of life as people who are sighted.

We offer a range of courses through the year, all led by speakers who are nationally recognised as being experts in their fields. The following courses are running in March:

21 March 200, Bringing Literature Alive: story telling and sensory communication for children and young people who are blind or partially sighted with or without additional needs

23 March 2007, Train The Trainer: meeting the needs of disabled people on training courses.

We also run:
Educational and Career Planning: supporting young people who are blind or partially sighted through transitions;
Dolphin Supernova: computer access, a one-day workshop;
Using Tactile Graphics with pupils who are blind or partially sighted, an introduction;
An Introduction to Working with Blind and Partially Sighted Children.

Costs are: Professionals £75, Voluntary and Charitable Organisations £50, Parents £35.

To reserve your place, for future dates or further information, please call 01509 632 400.

rnibeastmidlandsandeast@rnib.org.uk www.rnib.org.uk
RNIB East Midlands and East. PO BOX 8382 Loughborough, Leicestershire, LE11 9BL

By Brian Beach

Sue Goult
Over 1000 people attended Family Learning Events held in Leicestershire Libraries during Family Learning Week in October.
Some of the events were put on, in conjunction with local partners such as Leicestershire Adult Learning Services, and Loughborough University with additional resources provided by Heritage Services.
Many of the events this year were based around the theme of Discovering Building. Bob the Builder proved to be a huge draw at Coalville, Loughborough and Melton Libraries.
Over 350 people attended the event at Loughborough and had the chance to take part in a number of family activities as they waited for Bob to arrive.
Building stories, tracking down answers about some of the world’s most famous buildings and creating a building collage of the town were just some of the activities on offer.
Loughborough University’s Civil Engineering Department was also on hand to give expert advice to budding engineers as families created their own newspaper towers.

Parents and their children live increasingly busy lives. Finding time to do something together can be hard. Family Learning Week in Leicestershire Libraries this year gave many families the chance to spend some of their busy lives doing something enjoyable and creative together.
Families came to see Bob the Builder, but also got an insight into what the library had to offer all year round.
Sue Goult, Library Development Worker, Loughborough can be contacted on 01509 638226 or sgoult@leics.gov.uk

We offer FREE confidential advice and information on Health & Social Care Services.
We offer support to help signpost people with learning disabilities, their families and friends who provide regular care to choose the right services for them.

We enable people to gain greater access to the full range of community facilities and involved in the planning, development, delivery and evaluation of services.

We help to give more choice and control for people with learning disabilities to communicate during assessment and review processes.

Contact Khadijah Chowdhury 66 Nottingham Road, Loughborough Leicestershire LE11 1EU
01509 261 651 or kchowdhury@btconnect.com or crec@btconnect.com. Visit our website: www.charnwoodrec.org

Thursday 22 March 2007
At Loughborough Town Hall
At 7.30pm to 9.30pm
Loughborough Council of Faiths will be holding an evening of faith performances.
Thanks to grants from the Faith Communities Capacity Building Fund and the Charnwood Borough Council all the major faiths in Loughborough will be coming together to provide a memorable event.

It will be a delightful evening of performances, a chance to meet people from the different faiths and socialising with a light buffet included.
Tickets will be available from the Town Hall Box office on 01509 231914 or box.office@charnwood.gov.uk
Should you require any further information please contact 01509 261651or enq@lborofaiths.org.uk

Name change
Representatives of member organisations and individual members voted at the Extraordinary General Meeting on 19th December 2006 to change the name of the CVS to Voluntary Action Charnwood, VAC. This opens the way to the merger with Shepshed and Syston Volunteer Centres, which will take full effect on 1st April 2007. (More details about services available from all 3 centres follow inside.)

Trustees
A new Board of Trustees was also elected, now including 2 people from Shepshed and 2 from Syston as of right. A period of Trustee Induction and training will run until March to ensure effective governance.

Meeting needs
A Marketing Prospectus is being circulated soon, informing you what we offer now, and plans for the future. You are invited to tell us what you think about our current services, and any unmet needs you have that you want us to help with.

Volunteering
Enclosed with this edition of Charnword is the Volunteer Centre Loughborough newsletter, giving a comprehensive overview of Volunteering information and support we provide now in Loughborough. From 1st April this will be borough-wide.

Transport
Charnwood Community Transport, a service managed by Voluntary Action Charnwood based at John Storer House, is in the final stages of integrating the 2 car transport schemes from Loughborough Community Care, including Dial-a-Ride. We hope that this new service will also be operational from 1st April.

Community Well-being
John Storer House continues as a thriving Community Centre, and is seeking to ensure all users get the maximum benefit from the full range of activities available, from Monday to Friday, morning, afternoon and evening. To assess and meet individual’s needs, a Well-being Service is proposed, and new funding will be sought to improve physical activity levels, mental stimulation, social interaction, and nutrition, to achieve better overall health.

Supporting groups and communities
Under VAC we will continue to provide Capacity Building to Voluntary Organisations and Communities around the borough, now also building Social Capital in priority areas under the Local Area Agreement, as part of new Neighbourhood Action Teams, in collaboration with Charnwood Borough Council, and other local agencies.

A small funding contribution has enabled us to create a new part-time post of Community Capacity Building Officer, which is now recruiting. The main purpose will be to work with people in local communities, providing learning opportunities, which build confidence and skills, to be active citizens, improving local delivery of public services, and building strong and prosperous communities. See more details below, or log on to web site. Details will be on our website at the beginning of January. The closing date for applications: Friday 19th January at noon.

Using computers effectively
Another Job Vacancy is available for an “e-Administration Coach”:
1)To set up and implement electronic management information systems to support services provided by Voluntary Action Charnwood, in particular, modules of Volbase
2)To provide on-the-job, front-line support, and coaching to staff using Voluntary Action Charnwood ICT systems; and organise off-the-job learning opportunities, possibly leading to accreditation
Details will be on our website at the beginning of January. The closing date for applications: Friday 19th January at noon.

Staff training
As well as Service Improvements already underway, 2007 will see further encouragement to staff to take opportunities to learn and develop themselves. VAC is also involved in new measures of organisational performance and quality standards.
Collaborating across the county
Outside the borough, Voluntary Action Charnwood is involved in discussions to form a new Sub-regional Infrastructure hub – agencies working together to join-up their activities, and act as channel between the national and regional levels, through to us locally. Neil Lambert, Chief Executive, has served on the Leicester Shire Consortium, which liaised with Leicestershire County Council who are the main funders of the voluntary sector at sub-regional level.

by Neil Lambert, Chief Executive

The Department of Health (DoH) required that all GP practices be involved with Practice Based Commissioning (PBC) by December 2006.
GPs are allocated budgets to commission their own services for their patients. There are some services however that will not be included in the PBC budget (such as East Midlands Ambulance Services or more specialist services).

Charnwood and North West Leicestershire have a cluster of 37 practices and through this cluster GPs will be able to commission services from alternative providers.
The voluntary and community sector (VCS) is well placed to provide some of these more holistic services - indeed one of the key benefits of our sector is the diversity we can offer.

As a sector we need to come together to discuss where we would like to be involved with PBC and what opportunities there could be for us.
Sallianne Thomas, Health & Social Care Involvement Worker, will be hosting an event that covers Charnwood and North West Leicestershire in January at John Storer House in Loughborough to discuss PBC, its impact and its implications, and most importantly its opportunities for us as a sector.

The Primary Care Trust (PCT) has set up a working group to explore how the voluntary sector can be involved in PBC. This working group will be a good link into the PCT, enabling us to directly feed through what there is in the VCS that could offer procurement opportunities.

If you would like to be kept up to date with PBC and especially our VCS meeting in January, please contact Sallianne Thomas on 01509 631785 or sallianne.thomas@
voluntaryactioncharnwood.org.uk

Sallianne Thomas

Over the past 12 months, attendance at support groups’ meetings, held around the borough, has grown. We have recently enjoyed celebrating Diwali, visited Chatsworth House and have ‘rounded off’ the year with festive activities including a Christmas meal at Quorn Grange and ‘getting crafty’ - making beaded baubles at the Shepshed group.

The Project took part in a Training and Information event to mark Carers’ Rights Day on December 8th. The event, held at Moat College, Leicester, was linked to the Carers (Equal Opportunities) Act 2005. The Act was widely welcomed, for its formal recognition that a person who carers for someone should also have the chance to combine their caring with the opportunity to undertake paid work, training, get involved with volunteering or even have a social life! As a result, these things should be taken into account when a carer is offered a Carers’ Assessment.

The National Extension College, NEC, attended the event to provide information on their ‘Carers into Education Project’ that offers family carers living in the Eastern Region or the Midlands, aged 16 years or over, courses at reduced rates. The range of courses available include GCSEs, AS and A2s, vocational subjects, such as book-keeping or child-minding, along with creative writing, counselling and study skills.
NEC courses are through distance learning, so studies can be fitted around caring responsibilities. Carers have the support of a subject tutor and a personal mentor. The personal mentor has regular contact with the carer throughout the course, at times and in a format to suit the carer.

In addition, the NEC will work closely with the Princess Royal Trust Carers’ Centre to support carers while they study.

For more information, please contact Karen Robinson on 01509 631783.

Charnwood is set for the launch of an exciting new mentoring programme for young people in the New Year. The programme will work with young people who have been identifed as being at risk of offending and will help their development as active citizens within the community.

By pairing young people with appropriate mentors in a ‘professional friendship’ the scheme helps engage and enthuse many disengaged young people into active and positive roles within the community.
Given recognised training and support, the pairs spend five hours a month in a year-long mentoring relationship. Mentors offer guidance, support and advice to assist the young person to achieve their goals – in education, employment and personal and social development.

The scheme is the result of a strategic partnership between Charnwood Community Safety Partnership and Charnwood 20:20 (a charity set up by people already actively engaged with projects for young people in the community). Recruitment has now begun for young people and mentors. So if you would like to find out more information, please contact
Louise Gough on 01509 634535 or louise.gough@charnwood.gov.uk or
Andy Cook on 01509 234234 ext 206 or andy.t.cook@gmail.com