Newsletter
Increase your employability at the Birmingham Settlement Job Club!
Birmingham Settlement’s Job Club has gotten off to a great start! Launching on 17th April it’s already been immensely popular and had a good attendance each week. So far our volunteers have been helping people to complete application forms and looking at the possible criteria that employers might use for short-listing.
If you’re looking for work and want to refine your CV, develop great interview skills or want to find out how the Internet and digital technology can support your job search come along to find out more. Our netWORK sessions will look specifically at using social media and digital tools to portray a positive image of yourself and help you to connect with potential employers in new ways.
If you’ve got skills you would like to share then we’re also looking for volunteers to support the delivery of Job Club sessions. We’re particular looking for people who have some experience in IT, but anybody who has some knowledge they would like to share can help out.
The Job Club runs every Tuesday from 1pm-3pm at the Centre for the Aston Family.
For further information about the Job Club please contact Sourour Trevelyan on 0121 250 0771 or sourour.trevelyan@bsettlement.org.uk
Join our Community Development team.
Our Community Development team are currently seeking three staff members to support their work out in the community. What is community development about?
Image thanks to Niall Kennedy.
Capacity-building for smaller organisations…
Image thanks to Adopt a Negotiator.
Aston and the surrounding inner city areas…
Image thanks to Elliot Brown.
Digital inclusion and how technology and social media can benefit our work…
Image thanks to Michael Surran.
Localism and how to strengthen local networks, culture and identity…
Image thanks to Nick Booth.
People and how they can make the most of their community.
Image thanks to Matthew Kenwrick.
Please see each vacancy page for further information:
- Development Manager: http://birminghamsettlement.org.uk/vacancy/development-manager/
- Development Officer: http://birminghamsettlement.org.uk/vacancy/development-officer/
- Development Assistant: http://birminghamsettlement.org.uk/vacancy/development-assistant/
Government right to do U-turn on Welfare to Work Programme.
The following article was wirtten by Martin Holcombe about Birmingham Settlement’s withdrawal from the Welfare to Work Programme, and was originally published in the Birmingham Post on 8th March 2012.
Birmingham Settlement was delighted to hear the news that the Government had re-thought part of its Welfare to Work Programme, and no longer intends to stop benefits for those people on placements who don’t complete the full term.
However, as one of Birmingham’s oldest charities, with debt advice and the welfare of the vulnerable at its heart, we feel there is still a long way to go.
Under the work experience scheme, which is voluntary, young people are placed with an employer for between two and eight weeks.
They receive benefits during this placement, but before the Government did a U-turn they risked losing their Jobseeker’s Allowance for a period of time if they failed to show up after their first week.
While we appreciate and understand the need for a good work ethic, the individual to be placed has very little say in where they end up.
When you consider organisations providing placements are paid for their provision, the potential for negative or inappropriate placements becomes clear.
Our vision is to help people to lead happy fulfilling lives and we don’t see how forcing them into unpaid placements or have their benefits stopped aligns itself with creating opportunity and choice.
Last week charities including Marie Curie, Shelter and Scope announced they were pulling out of the programme and would no longer accept placements, and we at Birmingham Settlement followed suit.
Whilst we are fundamentally supportive of programmes that help people into employment, our concern with the Welfare to Work Programme is the way in which this is done. We acknowledge that a change has been made, but the emphasis still seems to be placed on outputs and financial gain, rather than on the needs of each individual.
This is particularly worrying where vulnerable people are concerned, as they can be incorrectly placed without receiving any of the specialist support they need – which could have a serious long term impact on their confidence to work.
Furthermore pressure is placed on organisations delivering the programme as they move away from work centred around people towards box-ticking and a focus on outputs.
One great example is a work placement we had recently – a young man who was out of work, but volunteering with us. He’d cherry-picked the Settlement because he had a degree in criminal justice, and was interested in our work with offenders.
Obviously he was of huge value to us and we to him, but the sub-contracting agency, who had no in-depth knowledge of his skills, personality and ambitions just saw him as a box to be ticked, and attempted to move him away to work in a supermarket. A great example of how, by ticking boxes, a human being could be taken away from a mutually beneficial environment, and placed somewhere they would be unhappy and unfulfilled – just to reach targets.
So it was with great relief to see the pressure to change the policy, which has come equally from both the public, private and third sector, has had an impact and forced them to re-think the way people are supported into work.
As a final note, I’d like to add that although the Settlement has declined to participate in this scheme, along with a growing list of businesses and charities, we’d like to emphasise that anyone already on a placement with us will be encouraged to continue as a volunteer outside of the programme, and that we are fully-supportive of helping people to get back into work.
Work experience placements.
In the first few weeks of February Birmingham Settlement had the pleasure of having two girls, Lauren and Shantae, from St Paul’s Girls School with us doing their work experience. The girls were involved in a wide range of activities during their time with us, including:
- Learning how to use a wide range of office/digital equipment, including Microsoft Office, a database package, flipcameras, photocopiers and blogging software.
- Setting up a library at the Centre for the Aston Family.
- Conducting interviews with people at the Centre for the Aston Family.
- Helping with children in the Nursery and Stay and Play.
- Producing a presentation about our allotments.
- Working in the Newtown shop sorting and pricing items.
- Assessing volunteer application forms and deciding who might make a good volunteer.
- Coming up with fundraising events ideas and planning how they would run them.
We hope the experience of working with Birmingham Settlement and the wide range of activities we have been able to get them involved in has provided a useful learning experience. Speaking at the end of the placement Shantae commented, “I have learned what the real life is all about.”
Birmingham’s Affordable Nail Care Service
Our Nail Care Service is going strong with nail carers based at locations across the city. Why not check out our new Nail Care website www.bhamnailcare.co.uk to find out more? It provides lots of information about the services available including a postcode checker to find out where your nearest nail carer is located
We currently have an expanding list of more than 40 nail carers working across Birmingham with another troupe of students getting trained up this term at Birmingham Metropolitan College.
Job Club at the Centre for the Aston Family.
A new Job Club is starting at the Centre for the Aston Family to assist individuals with gaining and improving job-seeking skills, including:
- Searching for opportunities – in newspapers, by telephone and on the Internet.
- CV writing.
- Application writing.
- Mock interviews.
One-to-one help and support will be available. The Job Club will run on Tuesday afternoons from 1pm to 4pm at the Centre for the Aston Family. If you are interested in attending please contact reception at the Centre on 0121 250 0777.
Digital Inclusion Project
Birmingham Settlement has been funded by UK Online to be a UK Online Centre. The purpose of Online Centres is to encourage and support people who do not use the internet or other digital technology, to do so.
We are recruiting Digital Champions. A Digital Champion is anyone who shows, or supports another person to get online. Some of our Digital Champions volunteer at our Centre for the Aston Family, by spending a couple of hours a week supporting new IT users at our cyber suite. If you would like to volunteer to simply help someone new to computers to access the internet, contact Sourour Trevelyan on 0121 250 3003.