Who are

we?

Reaching Your Potential (RYP) is a project working with young

people and young adults aged up to 21 who are serving a

prison sentence or who have been released from prison. We

are funded by the Big Lottery and work in partnership with the

3 Sussex Youth Offending Teams.

We are a voluntary project and young people and young

adults can choose whether or not to accept the support

offered. We only offer support to clients who will be living in

Sussex upon release.

The aim of the project is to support people in custody and for

6-months after release to achieve a successful resettlement in

the community by;

- Avoiding further offending.

- Finding constructive things to do in their free time.

-Assisting to find an educational or training course or

employment.

We are looking for volunteers between 16 - 25 years of age to

assist us to make decisions about how we can best support

young offenders, by guiding the direction & development of

the project in terms of Marketing and Promotion, Evaluation of

the projects practice, interventions with clients and outcomes

both at a local and national level. We are also looking for

volunteers to act as Mentors in the community.

Why should you

volunteer?

It’s a great way to improve your skills, build up your CV and

broaden your experience for a job, college or university

application.

Increase your confidence and do something important: all our

volunteers contribute to the development and direction of the

project and its decision-making process.

Try something new, meet new people and have some fun, whilst

gaining a sense of achievement and satisfaction by helping

other young people.

Get training in Peer Mentoring, Research & Evaluation,

Communication Skills, Equality, Working in a Team and Decision

Making.

To have an opportunity to sit on the Steering Group with the

Heads of the Sussex Youth Offending Teams.

You get all your travel expenses paid back, and free snacks at

meetings!

Depending on your chosen role you will be offered either group

or one-on-one supervision with the Coordinator on a monthly

basis.

Volunteer Information

Pack 2014

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What do we expect

from you?

A commitment to attend team meetings (at least monthly) for at least 6

months, and also any big combined project meetings (usually one every

6 months). In addition to your team meetings, other activities are often

available (e.g. representing RYP at community events around the

county), and you can choose to take these opportunities as and when

you can. Open communication is absolutely vital.

We expect you to:

- text your team coordinator in advance if you are unable to make a

meeting

- raise any issues or concerns with your coordinator RYP staff

- respond promptly to texts and emails from your coordinator / RYP staff

An interest in promoting and achieving a successful resettlement and

positive outcome for young offenders, so that they do not reoffend and

end up back in prison or cause more harm to the community.

The ability to work with others in a collaborative, encouraging way as

part of a team, and help to create an environment of participation and

empowerment to all, at all times.

A commitment to your personal development, able to identify areas of

personal interest (with career development in mind) and any training

needs.

Your energy, enthusiasm, ideas and personality!

Still interested?

Thanks for reading. If you are interested in volunteering and

getting involved in Reaching Your Potential, we would love to

hear from you. Please find all of our contact details below.

What are the

choices?

If you are aged between 16 and 25 and are considering

volunteering, there are different parts of the project you can

choose to get involved with:

Volunteer Digital & Social Media & Marketing & Promotion Team

The Team would be responsible for developing new marketing and

promotional publications and to develop digital and social media

marketing and participation opportunities such as a RYP Face Book

account and similar.

Volunteer Mentor Team

The team would be trained to mentor RYP clients in the community

and would receive training and support via monthly group

supervision or 1 to 1 supervision as needed facilitated by the

Coordinator. The development of a mentoring team would provide

RYP clients with an opportunity to receive support and guidance

from peers.

Volunteer Research & Evaluation Team

The team’s role would include developing new evaluation tools in

consultation with RYP clients and to interview RYP clients in the

community regularly throughout the course of a RYP intervention, in

order to identify what clients have found helpful and not so helpful,

so as to guide future practice.

The team would also interview RYP clients pan Sussex on

completion of education or training courses and similar to

identify individual learning, progression and any increase in

personal aspirations and again influence future project

practice.

The team would also participate in the Beyond Youth Custody

(BYC) National Research and Evaluation Programme by

feeding in the research findings to the programme, and

meeting with members of the BYC research team both locally

and nationally.

Volunteer Activities Team

The Volunteers Activity Team would work closely with the RYP

staff in order to identify commission or co-deliver new and

existing opportunities for RYP clients in the community to be

funded from individual budgets.

If you think you have the skills that we are looking for, we

would love to hear from you

Company Ltd by Guarantee Number: 3853734 | Registered Office: Reed House, 47 Church Road, Hove BN3 2BE | Registered Charity Number: 1079570

Call or text us: 07741240452

e: ryp@sussexcentralymca.org.uk

w: www.sussexcentralymca.org.uk/ryp

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