Beulah Community Church wanted to engage more with our community, which we know is a deprived area. The pre-school use our Youth Centre throughout the week apart from a Thursday afternoon so we were hoping to engage further with the families who attend the pre-school, by offering a warm space along with hot drinks and snacks and toys for the children to play with. We were also hoping that older neighbours might appreciate a warm space and the company of others.
We advertised the warm space via our website, social media and leaflets and posters in local amenities as well in letterbox leafleting. The pre-school manager advertised the warm space on the group chat for pre-school. We were aware that some of the people who had attended last year could not attend this year as we had changed the day we could offer this. We asked for volunteers from the church to help run the session - welcome people / provide drinks and snacks etc - and we were fortunate also to have help offered from a neighbour and a volunteer from another local church.
We organised the administration needed - updating various policies and organising the heating. We were disappointed initially with the low numbers who came especially the fact that no parents/ carers came. However we were approached by Spark charity who had contacted Action Together to ask if they knew of any availability facility in Hollinwood to run a Baby Boogie session. We had an initial meeting and showed them our premises and agreed that we could run the session alongside our warm space. We could offer hot drinks and toast etc as well as a warm room in which to run the baby group. Kim produced a poster which we then advertised in a similar fashion as before - social media / leaflets / group chat etc
We made sure the room was warm and clean and that our volunteers were there to welcome both the families attending and the leaders for the baby session. We were able to offer drinks and snacks at the start of the session for the parents / carers.
We were very encouraged that the numbers attending the baby boogie session increased each week with 10 families attending towards the end. The parents / carers / grandparents were all extremely appreciative of the session and really engaged with it. They said they liked the fact that the room was cosy and carpeted and that everyone was friendly. Although we only attracted a few older people to the warm space we did achieve our main aim of engaging with families / children in a way that we had not expected!
We are able to build on this now and will continue to offer the same space and drinks/ snacks after Easter until the end of May when we will review the position.
We realise that for a warm space to be successful we need to be able to offer something else to run alongside it. We have approached Lifelong Learning also but have not found a course they can offer at this time. We know too that some people may not feel comfortable entering church premises (even though the warm space is in an adjoining room).
It is also a priority going forward to improve our social media presence.