As part of their programme, the teens focus on ways that they can benefit their local communities, this can be by transforming an area, helping local charities or helping to raise awareness of issues within their hometown.
The Loughborough teens worked with a local Canal Trust called, Peter le Marchant Trust.
During the holidays the Trust offers pirate boat rides, education trips and keeps the waterways clean and ready for use. The NCS teens worked hard cleaning barges, repairing old boats and even worked hard to transform the garden space at the trust, even creating a sensory garden for visitors to enjoy.
The young people learned how to do risk assessments themselves to transform the garden and even built and painted a fence within the space of a week.
They also helped with pirate week, dressing up and taking part in fundraising activities for the trust such as sponge throwing, a bake sale and a raffle.
"The trust runs solely on grants and donations, so to have the help of NCS young people has been such a godsend to us, they’ve worked so hard and achieved so much for us." said Angie Whitmore, Youth Project Co-ordinator. "The trust really wanted to being more young people to us, so working with NCS was perfect. The input from them and what they’ve done at the trust is phenomenal. They’ve created a long-term impact on the trust and we hope that they come back again”. Angie Whitmore, Youth Project Coordinator.
Clare le Marchant, Founder of the Trust added: “I think the work is just fantastic, anyone who’s involved with this has found that they’re really contributing and that their own self esteem has gone up as well as increasing the joy and happiness to others who visit the centre.”
A NCS teen said: “I was dreading NCS but there’s been nothing to dread, this week at the Trust has been my favourite, cleaning the boats and the canal, it’s nice to make a difference and volunteer for something. We probably would never have volunteered for anything like this if it hadn’t been for NCS”.
