We are The Kendleshire Kids Foundation.
The Kendleshire Kids Foundation’s programme is about using golf for the development of young people, ‘Golf for Good’, who have experienced adversity and trauma and to support them in building resilience for the future and improve physical health. We are the first ‘trauma responsive’ #SportForGood and #GolfForGood charity in the world.
Empowering young people by building resilience, self- esteem, encouraging teamwork and teaching life skills are all important for their future outcomes.
We use The Kendleshire Golf Club’s facilities, with the support of our specialist PGA golf coaches and one to one mentoring support through our associated company, Strive Youth Engagement, whose specialist workers use a person-centred, trauma responsive approach, as trusted adults, understanding how important this is for positive future outcomes.
The young people are provided with mentoring, golf coaching, golf equipment, food and drink. They also have opportunities to take part in work experience and online learning to gain certificates towards various life skills and future employment and are rewarded in various ways for their commitment to the programme. This all comes free of charge for their referring organisations or families.
To be part of the programme, referrals are accepted from schools or other avenues and there is no time restriction for them to be part of this great cause.
Continual monitoring and assessment, using our own taylor made packages for both mentoring and golf, is carried out to demonstrate the impact of the programme and to share learning across our community.
All workers and volunteers hold the relevant enhanced DBS certificates and certificates for safeguarding, child protection and ACE Awareness training. Many have also undertaken various mental health training. Nearly all members of our team are highly experienced in working with children and young people and many are highly qualified in their respective fields.
Our ‘Trauma Responsive’ Pledge Commitment
What makes us “Trauma Responsive”?
Multiple, serious and/or toxic stress/trauma (deep trauma) often holds a consistent influence on the entire lifetime of those that experience it. Therefore, it goes without saying, deep traumas will often take a lifetime to learn to proactively cope with, and possibly heal from. Many people may never reach a stage of full or complete recovery, but can, with trauma sensitive environments, people and services, consistently, around them. People can learn to better cope and live a full life with it, but this will be best supported when working with a person, not on a person, and will be at their own pace. Whether we are working with young people who have experienced violence, abuse, neglect, (due to mental or physical disability), racial, social, emotional or health inequalities, there are clear methods in which we can offer a safe environment that enables growth – (unlike the 10,000 hours rule (or thinking), we know coping with or healing from deep traumas will be more like a 20,000 hours rule to reach the same overall success & life balance, as a person living with less/no trauma/inequalities etc.) However, to be trauma responsive, is to be ‘responsible with trauma,’ that people carry, and consistently aid the process of learning to positively cope with, or heal, from its impact.
1. All our staff and volunteers hold purposefully relevant lived, learnt and qualified experience of, and/or knowledge, of coping with ‘deep traumas’ and often their ongoing impact across the life-course. Our staff and volunteers all have access to an immediate ‘supportive peer network’ and access to further clinical support, should this be required, at any time. This is fully agreed, understood, and supported by the entire organisation’s senior leadership team, staff, volunteers, and the organisation’s beneficiaries.
2. Long-term provision – Once a member of our services, we ensure that for all our staff, volunteers and beneficiaries, our services, programmes and support are available across the life-course, for all registered under our care. When we refer our beneficiaries onto other services/support, we will stay connected with them and continue to record progress, to ensure they know they have our support for life and always have a place to return should they ever need it again – therefore, we will never need to ask the same ‘repetitive trauma related questions’ and will actively avoid retraumatising the individual.
3. For the beneficiaries, we have purposely designed group sessions that are empowering, safe, supportive, and small. This is with a high level of ‘staff’ to beneficiary ratio, according to the individual beneficiaries’ requirements.
4. Every one of our beneficiaries, we work with, will have ongoing, sustainable access to a trauma responsive mentor, for one-to-one support, according to the needs of the beneficiary, outside of, and between the group-based sessions.
5. We always start and maintain a person-centred approach with each of our beneficiaries and, because of this, we are a ‘needs led’ organisation.
Here, at Kendleshire Kids Foundation, we all understand and agree, that if we do not maintain all 5 of the above statements – we can no longer say we are a trauma responsive service and will not advertise ourselves as such.