Point Made

In this episode, Tamsin, our stories lead at Centrepoint talks to Cassie about her journey navigating homelessness, mental health challenges and university.

Four years after moving on from Centrepoint, Cassie has achieved her dream to qualify as an art teacher and was keen to share her story to support and inspire other young people.

In this episode, Josh and Anna talk to resident Addi and former resident Andrew about the challenges of finding and securing employment when you are experiencing homelessness.

Addi also discusses his neurodivergence and how that can also pose a challenge to finding and securing long-term employment.

What can employers do to make things easier for young people entering the workplace especially if they are facing a range of challenges? Addi and Andrew have some ideas.

This month, for Refugee Awareness Week Josh and Anna talk to service manager Josh and service user "Adam" about the experiences of young people seeking asylum in the UK and those who support them. Trigger warning: this episode includes descriptions of torture and human trafficking.

In this episode Josh and Anna talk to Centrepoint's Head of Psychologically informed Environments, Helen Miles. Joining them is Georges, a former Centrepoint resident who now manages a martial arts gym.

The discussion this month ties in Mental Health Awareness Week and the focus is on the benefits of movement for your mental health.

Here are some links to a couple of the resources, organisations and research mentioned in the podcast.

https://www.youtube.com/user/yogawithadriene
https://www.youngminds.org.uk
https://centrepoint.org.uk/research-and-reports/mental-health-needs-homeless-young-people

In this month's episode, Josh and Anna talk to three young voters about political apathy amongst young people and the reasons why it is so important for young people to get out to vote and be the change they want to see.

Remember you can register to vote even if you don't have a fixed address.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/register-to-vote-if-you-havent-got-a-fixed-or-permanent-address

You need to register by the 16th April at 1.1.59pm if you want to vote in the local Mayoral Elections

It’s no surprise that young parents and particularly young mum’s have to overcome immense barriers to access education, employment and training. A 2017 piece of research by Action for Children found that only one in ten young parents went to university, compared to 45% of young people in general. 39% were only just scraping by financially. Social isolation was also an issue with 19% never or rarely seeing friends and it’s no surprise that mental health difficulties amongst young parents were significantly higher. This study was over seven years ago and with an ongoing cost-of-living crisis these numbers have undoubtedly increased.
 
This episode will examine the challenges young parents face when trying to access education, employment and training. It will also aim to highlight available support and discuss what more could be done.
 
We talk to young mum and former resident, Louise who highlights the difficulties that she faced as a young parent and a care leaver and signposts to some of the help available.

Louise mentions the charity Become who support care experienced young people https://becomecharity.org.uk/,  and  https://driveforwardfoundation.org/ 

Here are some other useful links if you are a young parent seeing education, employment or training (EET)

https://centrepoint.org.uk/what-we-do/education-training-and-employment
https://thisisusatuni.org/
https://www.gov.uk/care-to-learn
https://www.turn2us.org.uk/

This episode is hosted by Josh Ennis, a former Centrepoint service user and now an apprentice in the Fundraising Team. His co host is Anna Wooding, our Campaigns Officer. This discussion centres around the myths and stereotypes that frame the narrative around youth homelessness. Two of our lived experience ambassadors: Toni-Ann and Aminah, set the record straight and talk from their own personal experiences of vulnerability.

If you are at risk of homelessness, please contact the Centrepoint Helpline on 0808 800 0661 or go to Centrepoint's website for advice.

This episode is hosted by Josh who was supported by Centrepoint when he experienced homelessness five years ago. He currently works for the fundraising team.

He is joined by Taylor from our Rough Sleepers Team in Manchester as well as Joe and Danny, both ex rough sleepers.
Together, they discuss the realities of homelessness, challenge the misconceptions - for example, that homelessness is a lifestyle choice and offer solutions and advice to others.

The podcast was filmed at  the Cooperative Bank's Head Office in Manchester. The Cooperative Bank is one of Centrepoint's corporate partners. You can watch the episode at 

This month our LGBTQ+ inclusion Co-Chair and Media Officer, Megan Evans, hosts the podcast and talks to Maya Joseph-Chavez from Stonewall Housing who also runs https://qpocproject.co.uk/, an organisation for made of and for queer people of colour. We also have two former Centrepoint residents Hannah* and Mia*, a couple who met whilst living in a Centrepoint service.

We will be discussing the realities of being LGBTQ+, female and homeless and how these identities intersect with different cultural backgrounds and upbringing. We will talk about some of the challenges these identities and backgrounds present when it comes to being out and proud.

This month we were lucky enough to be hosted in the CAT Footwear office in Kings Cross and we have a special Q&A at the end with Daisy Flood from CAT talking about their corporate partnership with Centrepoint.

*names have been changed.

Vulnerable young people are being forced into homelessness due to unsafe, unstable and unaffordable housing. 

Supported accommodation helps to break the cycle and provide young people with the safety and stability they need to move on with their lives – but it can only do so much. 

When young people are ready to leave homelessness behind and live independently, they face even more obstacles – like the housing crisis, and age discrimination in the Universal Credit system. But it doesn’t have to be this way.  

In this episode of Point Made, current and former service users Ikra, Louise and Toni-Ann share their experiences of housing and talk about the changes they’d like to see.

They’re also joined by Dr Tom Kerridge, our Policy and Research Manager, as he shares some of the findings of our new research report, Somewhere to Call Home: Improving young people's access to affordable, safe and secure housing.