Wokingham Youth Counselling And Information Service

ARC project to increase our qualified youth counsellor staff base by 5 per annum

We would like to increase the number of fully qualified youth counsellors on our team. We have seen consistent annual increases in demand for our service of around 10-12%, with funding at the same levels for the past 10 years.

BACP guidance is that youth counsellors need more detailed training after their adult counselling qualification, we are looking for funding to allow us to recruit /retain fully qualified counsellors and offer them a training course that will get them to the required standards and above to work with the 11-16 age group.

We would employ a qualified trainer and run the training at our Wokingham offices.

For us to be able to continue to meet demand for our services and increase our staff base we are seeking extra funding that we are unable to source. This is a long term plan over the next 5 years to put us into a position of strength and future proof our provision for the cohort of young people who are currently at primary school.

After the 5 years we will have sufficient numbers of counsellors and would only need to run courses every 2-3 years to cover staff leaving or moving on.

Below is an outline budget for the recruitment and training of 10 youth counsellors per annum, they would see an extra 250 clients per year offering 1,500 extra sessions at arc, after school slots in the early evening after school. These are the most popular time slots as they do not interfere with school work, which creates extra anxiety, or the fear of other pupils knowing they are getting help, there still being a certain amount of stigma remaining around emotional and mental health issues.

Outcomes

We use our online outcome framework reporting and monitoring system for all our clients showing the difference counselling makes to the young person as well as their feedback on the counselling experience.