Volunteer Recruitment, Training & Support (360G-CheshireCF-A608905)
Cornwall Samaritans needs to continually support and train its volunteers, as well as recruit new volunteers. Our volunteers are vital as they deliver all of our services - from responding to our beneficiaries to the daily running of our charity. Ongoing training & support is vital to providing a listening service / helpline. Volunteers also deliver outreach, plus attend or host a range of meetings to help in the prevention of suicide – from inter-agency meetings to committee meetings and AGMs. Recruiting new volunteers has proven especially essential over the past year. We need to reach new potential volunteers and diversify the skills, knowledge and experience that we attract in order to widen our reach. The specific costs for our charity, just around recruitment, training and support will reach just over £8000 this financial year: Publicity: 1,000 Recruitment/referral phone: 220 Recruitment & Selection: 100 Volunteer Training Support: 1,000 Volunteer Care: 1,000 Refreshments 1,000 Council/Regional courses costs: 1,600 AGM / Branch meetings: 300 Director's Expenses: 600 Contribution towards overheads @20% of "project: 1,364 TOTAL 8,184 We are grateful to have received some grant support from the Pears Foundation and Tesco's Bags of Help towards this, leaving £5862 to raise.
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Grant Details
| Amount Applied For | 5000 |
| Amount Awarded | 5000 |
| Award Date | 2021-10-21T00:00:00+00:00 |
| Beneficiary Location: Country Code | GB |
| Beneficiary Location: Geographic Code | E01018808 |
| Beneficiary Location: Geographic Code Type | LSOA |
| Beneficiary Location: Name | Cornwall 044B |
| Grant Programme: Code | 2021 SE, SW London, EoE |
| Grant Programme: Title | Assura Community Fund Grants Programme 2021 |
| Impact Category | Advance people's physical and mental health, wellbeing and safety |
| Primary age group | All Ages |
| Primary beneficiary | People with mental health issues |
| Primary ethnicity | White |
| Primary issue | Mental health |
| Recipient Org: Charity Number | 1173481 |
| Recipient Org: Description | The only Branch of Samaritans in Cornwall, we are an independent registered charity and must raise our own funds. We provide a listening service for people in despair or distress with a vision that that fewer people die by suicide. We alleviate emotional distress and reduce suicidal feelings by listening without giving advice or judgement, providing a confidential opportunity to explore feelings. We have 120+ volunteers and no paid employees. We are totally self-funded and need to raise £85,000 in a “normal year”. We support mental health - responding to those who contact us in distress, receiving referrals and working in partnership with other organisations (such as the Cornwall Suicide Prevention Network) and raising awareness/preventative work. We respond to calls/texts/emails/face-to-face contacts, running almost 24/7, feeding into a national network of Samaritans response - where the first available Samaritan responds. Within Cornwall we proactively reach out into the local community (when government guidelines/restrictions allow), talking to people that need us, where and when they need us; e.g. A+Es, schools, universities and stations. Our awareness and preventatives work includes giving talks to groups e.g. Young Farmers, Rotaries and WIs, as well as taking stands at events. Suicide numbers in Cornwall continue to be higher than the national average, and the instances of self-harm and attempted suicide continue to rise; whilst some areas are in the top 10% most deprived in the country. With isolation and anxiety having a huge impact on mental health, we expect demand for our services to continue to increase. Since COVID, we have experienced a huge pressure on our services, with many branches running at 30% of their usual volunteers, due to being vulnerable themselves or having a vulnerable person in their household. In response, our volunteers in Cornwall took on as many additional listening shifts as possible. Our branch is vital - able to ensure social distancing in our Emergency Response Room and a tight decontamination regime. From May20 - to end April21, we responded to 24,000+ calls and 3000+ emails = nearly 27,500 calls for help, with our branch running for over 6600 hours. Our volunteers increased their support throughout the pandemic and lockdown, putting in additional hours to help “bridge any gaps” throughout the Samaritans network nationally. By helping someone directly, often loved-ones indirectly benefit. As a very conservative approximation, if each of the 27,434 calls for help indirectly affected 2 loved-ones, the total number of positive outcomes reached are in excess of 83,000 over the past 12 months. For those with a mental health diagnosis, the 'normal' support mechanisms are still not fully functioning, so Samaritans are playing a vital role at this crucial time. Cornwall Samaritans will also be involved in the roll out of a web chat - a new service particularly aimed at younger people (but not limited to) who are struggling to cope. |
| Recipient Org: Web Address | http://www.samaritans.org/truro |