What's the Challenge?
Southmead is within England’s top 10% of areas of multiple deprivation. Our bold ambition is to tackle this inequality, with everyone in our community thriving and having the same life opportunities as the rest of the city.
Who are we?
We are the only local charity supporting young people and their families through a programme of age-appropriate free to access youth and play sessions and tailored activities to support mental health, confidence, self-esteem and identifying their interests, talents and passions.
We have been running the The Ranch, Adventure Playground and Youth Space since 2018. The Ranch combines youth, play, adventure, nature, art, music, cooking, and sports activities. Located next to a nature reserve, it includes a multi-use games area, an adventure playground, a newly refurbished music studio, an arts studio, and a forest school area with a stream running through it.
We have many talented young people who attend our youth centre. In the last year they've learned music production by recording their own work and performing live, speaking at Bristol City Council's youth forum in front of all the city's councillors and reimaging our youth activities at our annual summer festival with a theme of sports activities celebrating the 2022 Olympics.
Many have SEND needs and find formal education doesn't suit their learning needs. They have found the creative arts ad informal learning environment has given them new skills and confidence.
Who will this make a difference to?
We have over 700 children and young people registered at our youth centre.
Our young people have so many ideas on what we do next, and we would love your help to make that happen!
Our young people love media and music. We've secured funding to regenerate an old shipping container into a state-of-the-art music studio and raised funds for music equipment.
What's next?
This is where you come in. Our young people want to work with music specialists and have the opportunity to attend cultural music venues like the Bristol Beacon and perform at events like the Bristol Harbour Festival. They want to learn and see if they learn, make and earn through music.
What will we do?
Our music studio is based in the heart of Southmead and acts as a community-focused venue for local young people in an area of disadvantage that has limited spaces for them to socialise.
Fundraising will enable young people to access a youth-led culturally relevant and engaging music programme that will promote personal and social outcomes alongside musical development. Our programme will run weekly on two evenings and include DJ'ing and rapping, lyric writing, recording music, visiting music venues, attending masterclasses, performance events and live performing. We will connect young people with the local music industry and be introduced to the different types of careers.
With your help we will deliver these activities in our youth and play sessions so as many of our young people can benefit.
We will work with local music partners such as Saffron, BIMM, Noods Levels and Access College to support safeguarding and progression as well as confidence, skills, social networks and emotional wellbeing.
The learning will take place every week and include:
- 96 sessions of music production workshops (two sessions per week) including, DJ'ing, MC'ing, rapping, writing lyrics, music production, recording and vocal performances.
- 1 chaperoned trips into Bristol to participate in or be an audience member of live performances.
- 1 chaperoned trips to Bristol Beacon and other music venues for masterclasses with local professionals in Bristol's music scene.
- 1local performance opportunities in our Summer Festival and August Bank Holiday Youth Music Event.
- 1 music Performance Careers event for school years 10 and 11.