Our Chairman Receives CBE

January 3, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Bill Holroyd, Founder and Chairman of OnSide, has been recognised in the Queen’s New Year Honours List.

Bill has been awarded a CBE in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the development of our charity, giving young people somewhere safe and inspiring to go, 365 days per year.

Jerry Glover, Chief Executive at OnSide said today that: “The Board and everyone connected with OnSide were thrilled with the news that Bill Holroyd, founder and Chairman of On-Side, has been awarded the CBE.

“Bill’s drive, ambition and total commitment to young people means that in just three years the charity now has four Youth Zones operating in Carlisle, Blackburn, Oldham and Manchester (Harpurhey) with a further four Youth Zones in the process of being built in Wigan, Preston, Chester and Wolverhampton.”

Commenting on his award, Bill Holroyd said: “This award is really recognition for the extraordinary commitment I have received from our supporters, private sector “Champions”, volunteers, staff and the Local Authorities who have given the Youth Zone projects their total support.

“From the outset I have had an outstanding Board of Directors, all of whom have worked with me to accelerate the growth of the charity. In addition we now have local Boards of Directors in each of the Youth Zones and collectively we share a common vision; to have a Youth Zone in every town and city in the country.

“My heartfelt thanks go out to everyone who has supported me and OnSide.”

Click here to find out more about what inspired Bill to develop Onside and what the charity’s vision for the future is.

Filed Under: OnSide News

Supporting OnSide

December 21, 2011 By Leave a Comment

We recently caught up with Conlon Construction’s Chair Theresa Noblett and Finance Director, Alan Cragg following a recent site visit to The Factory Youth Zone before its imminent opening in January 2012.

Alan told us why Conlon Construction decided to support OnSide and what they thought of The Factory Youth Zone:

Filed Under: OnSide News

CEO Blog

December 14, 2011 By Leave a Comment

CEO at OnSide North West

I didn’t know it but we are part of a movement…

When OnSide started about 3 years ago, I saw our work as all about young people in terms of; helping them, investing in their futures and giving them choice and opportunities.

But it is possible to see OnSide as part of a bigger movement which is all about communities, localism and building from the bottom up. Like minded people are out there and are coming up with creative and different ways to lead change in their areas. For example an interesting group called Spacemakers, set up in 2009 with the aim of doing something about the decaying shopping arcades and High Streets, which they saw as being a blot on their own landscape. Their first project was The Granville Arcade in Brixton, they got the owners, the council and local people together and now it’s alive with small local fledgling businesses.

OnSide is doing so much more than invest in young people, perhaps the really great thing is the opportunity our Youth Zones present for local people, councils and business to come together and regenerate a whole Community, through a desire to improve the lives of local young people.

It doesn’t take much to get people active, most of the time they want to be involved in improving the places where they live and they certainly want to invest both time and money in young people!

Some of the interesting groups doing similar things…

Space Makers
Grow Sheffield
Just Add Spice

Jerry Glover
CEO – OnSide North West

If you want to support OnSide and help improve our local towns and cities, the click here to Get OnSide.

Filed Under: CEO Blog, OnSide News

Invest In Our Future Workforce

December 9, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Private Sector DevelopmentJanet Dunnett manages Private Sector Development at OnSide, she discusses the affect record high youth unemployment is having on UK businesses…

“The news is full of the latest youth unemployment figures which are at a record high, with unemployment among under-25s having reached over 1 million. These are the highest figures since records began in 1992. What has been the government’s reaction and solution to this growing problem and how does this affect businesses now and in the future?

In a recent breakfast summit at Downing Street, David Cameron sought to identify barriers that prevent companies, especially small and medium-sized ones, from hiring more young people as apprentices, whether it is red tape, minimum pay rates or the training available from colleges.
However, a report by the Institute for Public Policy Research think tank says that government apprenticeship schemes are not helping enough young people – just 37,000 of the 126,000 apprenticeships created last year went to 16 to 24 year-olds. A raft of new initiatives has been announced over the last few weeks to combat the growing protests about this issue:

  • The Youth Contract, at least 410,000 work places will be found for 18 to 24-year-olds from next April at a cost of £1billion
  • Wage subsidies worth £2,275 will be handed to employers to take on 160,000 18 to 24-year-olds
  • Extra funding for apprenticeships and a £50 million programme to help persistently NEET 16 and 17-year-olds will be on offer too

The work placement scheme operating through Job Centres is to offer work experience to young people on benefits. A proportion of these young people do manage to secure employment following the placement but there have also been comments that it does nothing to break the cycle of unemployment and poverty but is actually verging on exploitation.

Do these kinds of placements, often low-skilled work, really help young people gain valuable skills and experience for the future? Are they of any value to businesses particularly if there is no-one available to train and supervise them – surely a growing feature of companies already stretched on staffing ratios? When the placements are properly structured, with support from an appointed member of staff, they do provide the type of work experience that is going to benefit young people and help them gain future employment.

However, what many young people need more than anything is a responsible and knowledgeable adult who can provide them with one to one guidance and advice about their career (and their life in some cases), inspiration and motivation. Many young people lack confidence in themselves and in the future so are handicapped before they even begin to think about a job. These are the kind of services that have been cut and will not be provided because they are expensive and time-consuming. Companies who are able to provide both work opportunities and staff who can mentor or coach young people will reap the rewards both for their company and in providing a skilled and focused workforce for other businesses.”

Peter Chambers, a partner at PwC, shares his thoughts about why investing in the future workforce is a priority for his company any why it should be a priority for all businesses:

Filed Under: OnSide News

Recruiting For Success

December 7, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Each month, we profile a member of staff from OnSide or from across the youth zone network to give you an insight into the people who are at the forefront of Youth Zone delivery. This month we caught up with Colin Powell, newly appointed Business Development Manager at Carlisle Youth Zone.

If you are interested to know more about working for our Youth Zones then visit our vacancies page for more information and current opportunities.

Filed Under: OnSide News

Young Leaders In Action

November 30, 2011 By Leave a Comment

On Saturday 26 November, over 70 young people from across the North West took part in OnSide’s Leadership and Team Challenge event to celebrate their successful completion of the OnSide Young Leader’s Programme.

The Programme’s finale, at Challenge for Change in Trafford, gave all participants a genuine experience of taking on a leadership role and work with a team in a challenging environment.

We took our camera along to the event to find out from some of the young people what they got out of the Young Leader’s Programme:

Andy Jackson, Volunteer and Youthwork Development Manager at OnSide explains why it is so important that we invest in our young people now and provide them with the appropriate skills to gain employment in the future:

Filed Under: OnSide News

OnSide & PwC ‘Summit’ Up

November 29, 2011 By Leave a Comment

On 24 November OnSide joined PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) at it’s head office in London for a Summit Event, to reflect on the results achieved since they started working in partnership eight months ago.

PwC generously volunteered the services of its Emerging Leaders Programme, which aims to accelerate the development of the firm’s future leaders, to work alongside our charity to help ensure its continued success.

The event was hosted by Stream 13 of PwC’s Emerging Leaders Programme, who have been working with OnSide since the start of the partnership to advise on three strands of the organisation; funding, shared services and impact measurement. The Summit Event provided the perfect opportunity to understand the team’s gained experience, lessons leaned and how the contributions to OnSide will be developed in the future.

David Roper, Partner at PwC:

I am extremely impressed with the depth of research and the value of the recommendations. I would like to convey my thanks for this excellent work to the ELP team.” Bill Holroyd, Chair of OnSide

At the event we caught up with Caroline Macefield, Simon Aldersley, Caroline Windsor and Tom Tyler from Stream 13 to get their views on why they chose to work with OnSide and what lessons they learnt from the project.

Thomas Calderbank from the myplace Support Team

Filed Under: OnSide News
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