Emerge has been hosting youth work activities at the amazing green Hut at the top of Bowling Park for many years. We are there EVERY DAY for at least an hour after school to spend time with young people as they leave school and start to head home.
The location of the Hut, just 100m from the gates of Bradford Academy means that it is easy for young people to drop in for five minutes and ‘check-in’ over a hot chocolate, to have a longer conversation to de-stress from the school day, or to get fully involved in the varied programme of activities we offer.
Over the last few weeks we have given the Hut a facelift physically – teams of young people helped decorate and refurbish the building, and we have developed an exciting new weekly programme so that each day has a different flavour.
The daily presence lays the foundation through positive relationships for more intentional and targeted work with young people.
Young leaders and Social Action – there are few things more inspiring than seeing young people taking the lead and starting to give back to other young people and their community. Well, that is exactly what the Young Leaders scheme does, and we are regularly humbled and inspired by the energy, passion and commitment which young people put into planning and delivering events in and around the park. Holiday activities – Bowling Park makes a great base for lots of our holiday activities including informal sports sessions, woodland skills and of course the amazing Parklife week every summer. This summer we had over 300 people of all ages at the last day of Parklife – what an amazing way to be part of bring the East Bowling community together in the sunshine!