Proton Foundation members are invited to the Annual General Meeting to be held on Wednesday 17th April 2024 at 7.30pm on Zoom. For more information, email us.
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Can you believe that we are already four weeks into the new school year?
We wanted to share with you the exciting news that we have restarted Flourish face-to-face courses and are launching Flourish Online for this term, and would love to keep you updated with the impact it is having.
• Since the beginning of the academic year, five ‘church’ hubs have been running 11 face-to-face projects in six different schools, working alongside 85 young people.
• Between now and Christmas, 26 schools are going to be launching Flourish Online with approximately 400 young people.
• We have three new hubs being trained in September, and they will be running their first face-to-face cohorts very soon after.
• We have delivered one hour awareness training to 32 Senco’s and teaching assistants to ensure Flourish Online is deployed successfully.
Thank you to Restore Collective, a hub running the Flourish Project in a school, for the lovely photos!
Before the schools broke up for the summer holidays, a couple of the young people let us know the impact the project had on their lives.
“I feel I can cope better if I feel down.”
“It’s changed how I look at myself, and I am starting to focus on the good things about me.”
This is why we do what we do!
This would not be possible without your continued support. We value your partnership with the Flourish Project. If you would be interested in running the Flourish Project in your community, do get in touch for more information.
Edenstone Foundation Pledges Support To The Flourish Project
“There’s an increasing awareness of mental health and the importance of developing a healthy mindset, particularly in the wake of the pandemic.”
We are so excited to share the news that the Edenstone Foundation has partnered with the Proton Foundation, and has very kindly pledged a £5,000 grant to The Flourish Project. This means thatFIVEschools across South Wales will benefit from The Flourish Project to help develop mental and emotional wellbeing.
The funding will be shared between Alway Primary School, Ponthir Church in Wales School, Tredegar Park Primary School in Newport, Libanus Primary School and Blackwood Primary School in Blackwood.
The Flourish Project is a programme we designed to equip young people with the tools to develop healthy self-esteem, mental and emotional well-being.
Phill Mann, the Flourish Project Manager, explained:
“We launched the Flourish Programme in 2017 and have already helped around 1,000 young people develop a healthy self-esteem, mental and emotional well-being. There’s an increasing awareness of mental health and the importance of developing a healthy mindset, particularly in the wake of the pandemic.
With the support of the Edenstone Foundation we will be able to reach more young people, helping them learn to create helpful thinking pattern and ‘growth’ mindsets, and to begin to recognise and set goals for the future.”
The Flourish Programme has been designed to target 9 to 16 year-olds, and it usually runs over eight one-hour sessions. In these sessions, we cover topics including exploring how beliefs are formed, the impact of social media on mental health, healthy online habits, and the importance of setting goals.
We have reported increases of between 24 and 31 per cent in happiness, mental wellbeing and self-esteem by those who have taken part in the programme.
The Edenstone Foundation funding for the project is has come from the Magor-based Edenstone Group’s two housing brands – Edenstone Homes and Bluebell Homes, in which they receive a proportion of the proceeds of every home sold to support good causes.
Chris Edge, from the Edenstone Foundation, said: “We recognise that children and young people need help and support as they try to figure out who they are and where they fit with their peers, while also completing their schoolwork and preparing themselves for the future. The challenges of the last 18 months have made this even more apparent and it has never been more importance to safeguard the future health of our children.
By partnering with the Proton Foundation, we’ll be supporting the delivery of the Flourish Programme in five schools. This will hopefully have a long-term impact on the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people enabling them to flourish into adulthood.”
To the Edenstone Foundation, we want to thank you for your generosity to the Flourish Project! We are so excited to see the impact that your support will have on the children and young people’s self-esteem, mental and emotional well-being.
It’s people like Karen that we love to partner with, as they are wanting to be part of the solution within their own communities to see change, to see transformation and to see young people ‘flourish’.
Connecting Crossgates is a charity who have a heart to see young people be equipped to reach their full potential.
As part of this, they recruit volunteers to go into local schools to sit and read with young people who are struggling with their literacy.
Halfway through 2020, Karen who leads the charity started to realise that the need was so much deeper than just the surface level need of young people being able to read. She understood that ‘happy children thrive and unhappy children didn’t thrive’, so she wanted to change the script, to see the young people that they were working alongside begin to thrive.
So, Karen approached us as a project and we gave her the resource to run a Flourish project in her local school. Here is what the Principal from this school said in a their newsletter,
“The journey of every young person was unique. They worked so well as individuals and as part of a team. Every single young person truly flourished, remembering each themed week and the key messages. The students were so happy and proud receiving their medals and certificates in the final week, and we are so proud of every single student who attended and engaged in The Flourish Project.“
We at Proton Foundation want to celebrate community leads who see a need and decide to step out and fill the gap within their local communities. It’s people like Karen that we love to partner with, as they are wanting to be part of the solution within their own communities… to see change, to see transformation and to see young people ‘flourish’.
“I have started to see my confidence grow, and get better and I’m hopeful that it will carry on”
Leanne Seal, one of our Flourish Project Facilitators from Kings Community Church in Aberdeen, tells us about a new challenge she encountered.
Read her inspiring story below
‘After running the Rooted projects this last term for a group of 12/13 year old boys I encountered a new challenge. The group were super quiet and seemed disengaged. One boy in particular caught my attention, as he didn’t want to speak or engage much during the first few weeks. After lots of encouragement and persevering with the project, he started to gain the confidence to speak in front of the group and began to really enjoy the activities. Then on the last week when giving feedback…he blew me away with his words.
“I’ve tried so many different things and projects like this, that all promise to help, but they never really did and I didn’t think that this one would either. But I have started to see my confidence grow and get better, and I’m hopeful that it will carry on.”
Hannah, CEO and Founder of The Flourish Project, reflects on Leanne’s encounter.
‘After hearing Leanne’s experience with her latest group, it suddenly occurred to me that ‘we’ never fully understand what’s truly taking place on the inside. If Leanne had judged this boy from his not wanting to speak and enter in, she may have just shrugged him off as another disengaged youth, meaning she would have missed the point.
Our vision is to reach 100,000 young people, yet we train our facilitators to go after the ‘one’.
We hear a number of stories from our facilitators similar to Leanne’s.
We understand the importance of investing in the ‘one’. We understand the significance that can take place where just ‘one’ moment can become a movement in a young person’s life.
We want to help churches, charities, schools and like minded organisations stand in the gap for the ‘one’. The need is huge. Young people need to know their value and worth.
We can be champions (community leads) in our communities. It just takes ‘one’..could you be that one?
Who: Iris and her husband Barney are our first ever Champions from Northern Ireland. Iris has worked as a nurse for 43 years and is currently a MS specialist nurse based in the Ulster Hospital in Belfast. She has been tirelessly adapting and caring for some of the most vulnerable in our society, continuing to offer consultations via zoom to care for her patients’ needs. I’m sure you’ll join us in thanking Iris and the thousands of other health care and NHS workers who have kept us safe and cared for us so well, especially over the last year.
Why: Not only does Iris professionally care for people in her work life, but she and her husband Barney are continually looking for ways to love and support others around them through their generosity. Iris became a Champion because as a mother she was very aware of the need to support our children, families and communities better. Iris has heard of the impact of the Flourish Project through her son who currently works with the project to promote it in his local area.
Thank you: Thank you for partnering with us Iris, and for championing children, families and communities. Without your partnership and support we know we couldn’t have had the impact we have had over the last three months in numerous local communities.
At the Proton Foundation we’re so thankful that you’ve partnered with us to answer the call to champion children, families and communities. We want to keep you up to date on what we have achieved together over the last three months.
Since establishing the Champion Membership on the 1st March 2021, we’ve been able to welcome 54 Champions to partner with us in our mission to champion children, families and communities.
As Champions, you’ve been more generous than we could have ever imagined. When we met as a team to talk about the Champion membership, our goal was to sign up 100 Champions by 1st June 2021 all contributing £3 each.
As I write this we’re now partnering with 54 Champions, but each Champion on average is giving £8.93 a month. This very simply means that together we’ve been able to smash our goal of 100 Champions donating £3 a month, and we’ve actually got the equivalent of 160 Champions donating £3 per month.
Because of your generosity, together we’ve been able to achieve more than we ever thought we could in our first three months in partnership.
Since March we’ve trained 34 adults from all across Great Britain to become Flourish Project facilitators. These 34 facilitators are a mixture of teachers, youth workers, children’s workers, staff from other charities, volunteers and parents who are now fully equipped to deliver the project to at least 10 children each, giving us the ability to impact at least 340 children and young people.
We’ve added 11 additional Hubs in Aberdeen, South Wales and the Midlands, these are centres that are equipped to go into their local schooling communities to deliver the Flourish Project.
From the Champion memberships inception in March to date, over 200 additional children are currently participating in the Flourish Project. This is something we expect to increase as our additional hubs begin to deploy the project.
We’ve released our Flourish Online ‘pilot’ to a number of schools across the UK giving out 123 licences. It has been well received by students and through this pilot we have had the opportunity to work through some initial teething problems with regards to the platform compatibility with certain school networks.
Thanks to your financial support we are able to pursue a number of solutions. Enabling us to and fully launch Flourish Online after September 2021.
Over the next three months we’re preparing to train more facilitators, deploy Flourish Online fully, add an additional 100 Champion members, have an additional five schools ready to deliver the Flourish Project in September 2021 and begin to roll out a few more new exciting ideas.
We value you and your continued partnership and support. We’re passionate about impacting 100,000 young people’s lives by 2030. We’re determined to continue to champion children, young people, families and communities and be a resource that inspires community transformation. We know this is not possible without your partnership and support, so thank you!
Please consider telling a friend or family member about the Proton Foundation and how they can play a pivotal role as a Champion just like you have.
Phil & the Proton Foundation team.
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So, Karen approached us as a project and we gave her the resource to run a Flourish project in her local school. Here is what the Principal from this school said in a their newsletter,
Leanne Seal, one of our Flourish Project Facilitators from Kings Community Church in Aberdeen, tells us about a new challenge she encountered.
