Bonding with Access Project Tenants
The thing I love about football is that it is a universal ice breaker. I was in Romania with a charity ‘Heart for Romania’ a couple of years back and these tough looking Gypsies came over to us looking like they wanted trouble. We pulled a football out and then suddenly their faces lit up and we ended up bonding over a game of good old fashioned 11 aside.
Two months ago, KCAH residents started attending football training on Thursday afternoons. Each Thursday we get a slightly different turn out of residents, mainly male, although now we have one promising young female star who has already completed her FA premiership coaching level 1. Once a month we have a match day. The first match day was a humbling experience. We played 5 games, won the first 2 and then lost our composure and fitness in the last 3. I personally came away with a broken ankle !
But, it was good. Everyone bonded, everyone felt like they wanted to do better but most importantly everyone had a good day (apart from when the ref made some dodgy calls).
Mind you, football is not the only activity the tenants have been taking part in. At the end of April we had an illustration workshop/ get together where a bunch of tenants just sat together and drew different pictures. This was a very therapeutic time and gave us an opportunity to chat, get creative and expressive. Again it gave an opportunity for tenants from different houses to build friendships. These drawings have been incorporated into our updated tenant handbook.
Looking forwards to summer 2008
On June 5th 2008 I arranged for a lady called Laverne Hunt who is founder of the Media Community Network to hold a free workshop to empower KCAH residents to make a documentary. As I’ve made a couple of documentaries myself, I was aware of the benefits. It was a team building process, where individuals gained confidence and new skills as well as respect.
On July 5th 2008 we will be taking a bunch of tenants who have made a positive contribution to KCAH to the “O2 Festival” in Hyde Park so they can let their hair down and dance. A lot of our tenants can’t afford to go on holiday so even if we can only afford to help them break out of their normal environment for the day, we’re looking forward to it being one of the best days of the year. We are able to do this with money awarded to KCAH for this specific purpose.
So far we have had 100% pass ratio on applicants we’ve referred onto the Transitional Spaces Project (TSP) and we have built a good relationship with the team there. TSP is only running until October 2008 and seems to be a great cause to help tenants move on to independent living. The support is good and they give the tenants a grant to pay for a deposit on a privately rented accommodation. We hope that this is one more way to help some of our tenants to move on successfully.
Nathan Erasmus: Housing and Resettlement Officer
