XLR8 Summer School: To run a summer school for children to support their health and well-being and encourage social cohesion during the school holidays
XLR8 Summer schools are fun, engaging and active courses which help young people under the age of 18 to develop their personal attributes. They have been running during school holidays, with the aim to develop key skills of enterprise, communication and teamwork. XLR8 encourages young people to challenge themselves through competitive games, make new friends during team building activities and offers the opportunity for parents to get involved and join in the fun too! XLR8 is run by trained and qualified Health Mentors from Evolve.
XLR8 is a new initiative that we want to introduce to families with the aim to creating a positive, creative and talented environment which offers young people the chance to shine and share. XLR8 not only helps nurture and discover talent, but also meets young people’s wellbeing needs. The children don’t necessarily realise the difference it is making, they just know that they are having fun!
We want to reach out to more young people in the Birmingham area, with particular focus on East Birmingham. We want to target around 100 young people who transition into secondary school from Year 6 to Year 7 to help also settle and dispel the fears they may have about starting secondary school. Not only is XLR8 known to support this but it plays an important role of improving their wellbeing and knowledge on health, lifestyle and nutrition. Much of our impact is monitored by our Impact Reports we produce based on participant feedback from our surveys. These are collated to help show the impact on learning for both primary and secondary schools.
“At XLR8 we have a passion for supporting young children to not only achieve their potential but to exceed their potential, then set new limits and targets and overachieve again and again and again!”
“XLR8 helps children connect with others and learn about the importance of giving to the community through various strands such as Vitality, Enterprise and Talent. Pupils can easily approach the Health Mentors as they are willing to listen, support and engage” – School Teacher
“Knowing XLR8 has worked with thousands of children from many different backgrounds, cultures and family circumstances, it has a unique perspective on how to help children right through their school lives. Without a doubt, one of the severest challenges our young people face today is the transition from primary school to secondary. XLR8 can make it a lot easier!”
“XLR8 helps you find hidden talents, gives you advice on food choices and lifestyle and the Health Mentors take notice of us make it fun and exciting by running different activities and workshops. If it wasn’t for XLR8, I would probably be sat at home playing on the playstation.” – former XLR8 pupil
XLR8 is a fairly new initiative to part of the country. This means we have very little impact in other regions outside our existing networks. By supporting our campaign, it will enable us to fund and secure a week long course for schools in the East Birmingham area where we have yet to work within, impacting more lives and making a change for more.
Birmingham City Council has identified a clear and definite need to ensure that all our children start their school life with parity, an equal chance to thrive, prosper and succeed.
“Every parent wants the best for their children” say Birmingham Council.
“We want to help by providing every child living in Birmingham with an equal chance to have a really good start in life. This includes making sure they have a good level of development when they start school.”
And we agree, we wholeheartedly agree! Giving everyone an equal chance allows everyone the opportunity to fulfil their potential, promotes high levels of self-esteem, raises confidence, and can generate natural endorphins which are shown to reduce instances of mental health issues associated with self-worth. Allowing people to succeed, it creates a generation of healthy school leavers equipped to deal with the pressures they will face in life.
XLR8 will target young people who are in disadvantaged inner city areas, with focus on East Birmingham, where there currently are no holiday course opportunities. This will provide young people the opportunity to learn and engage with others in a new way, allowing them to develop their life skills which will enable them to progress in school better.
In turn this will allow many to make a better start to life and more importantly school life; having a friend on day one of a new school makes all the difference to settling in, especially if they already know the new school and associate it with having fun. This means transitions are less daunting and help pupils achieve better results, meaning better job prospects.
We will also be able to showcase the XLR8 programme to parents so that they will want to contribute towards course costs in the future.
£10k will help us put one hundred young people through one week of XLR8 in an area of Birmingham that is crying out for XLR8. Not only will we be able to reach out to new schools, communities and families, but it will further impact the many lives we have positively influenced thus far. It will provide an opportunity for more young people develop themselves personally, make new friends and discover talents they have. It will also help dispel the myths and fears around transition from primary to secondary school.
By delivering a successful course using crowdfunding, we will be able to approach local employers and ask them to sponsor future courses knowing that there is significant support within their community. This will help to development recruitment pipelines for employers and improved careers guidance and education for students.
If you’re not able to contribute but like what we’re doing, get the word out! Shout about us on twitter (#100XLR8 @JeevanSChagger ) whatsapp it to your friends, email it to your colleagues and talk about it with your family. And feel free to get in touch, ask us a question or share to show your support!