Watson Close

Children's Holiday Programme

The aim of the project is to offer a fully inclusive affordable high quality provision and activities for children and young people. We aim to keep the cost 25% lower than other setting. We promote children and young people’s creativity and emotion well - being, independence, self esteem and offer new, fun and exciting experiences.

This year we have had 384 families use our provision. We have support 12 children with special needs in our setting. By offering our service to children and young people with special needs it has enabled them to access a main stream setting in their own community with their peers and siblings.

One of the themes this year was Animal Magic where we had a visit from Animal man and the Falcon Sanctuary and many more. We have been out on endless trips to places like Monkey forest, Drayton Manor, Conkers Hatton country world, Go Kidz Go, Twin lakes and many more


Volunteers @ the Children's Holiday Programme

We have had 32 young people on the volunteers programme at Watson Close and 2 of those young people have special needs. They have all attended a child protection course and Health and Safety Training. This project gives them an opportunity to develop skills, give them self-confidence and to experience real working conditions. They are encouraged to be reliable and to have good time keeping. Many of our volunteers go on to gain qualification with the support of YMCA staff and gain employment as a result. At the end of the summer we took 12 volunteers on a residential to Cornwall on a surfing holiday.


NVQ Play-work Project

We have been working in partnership with Crackerjack Training Company with several students who are working towards gaining an NVQ in play work. The partnership with Crackerjack has been running successfully for a number of years and this year we have had a number of students complete their NVQ's.


Parenting Work

Sutton Central Group has funded the YMCA to deliver parenting courses. The aim of our parenting courses is to provide early intervention to prevent families falling into crisis and to support parents in developing strong family relationships and to provide help for parents and families at points of need and difficulty.

We have delivered a rolling programme of Time Out Parenting courses, including Time out for Teens, Time out with Anger, and Time out with ADHD. We have continued to have drop-in sessions where parents that have attended the courses have the opportunity to meet up with staff and readdress any difficulties they may still be experiencing. Also these sessions give parents a continued link to other parents and staff.

We have been running these courses for close on 3 years now and the attendance of them are continuing to be good. Evaluations and verbal feedback show a 30% improvement in parents confidence, understanding the emotional needs of their children and the ability to handle misbehaviour


C-Card Scheme

This scheme operates from the Sutton Coldfield YMCA it is funded by Birmingham City Council. It is a free advice and distribution service offered to young people aged between 14yrs and 19yrs.

Several staff at the YMCA has been trained to offer free confidential advice on sexual health and keeping safe.


Contact: Sharon Coton, Project Manager - 0121 354 5614

Enquiries: [ HERE ]

Sutton Coldfield YMCA
George Williams House, Watson Close, St Bernard's Road, Sutton Coldfield,
West Midlands   B72 1LE, England
  0044 (0)121 354 5614 - or -   0044 (0)121 321 1582

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Updated December 11th, 2009 Published by: Lichfield Web Design