OUR Impact

The Triple Fund
The Triple Fund provides access to additional support where funds are not available from existing sources, or where other sources of funding have been exhausted, and can be accessed for the following purposes:

1. Hardship Fund
Sometimes even small financial barriers can seriously derail the progress of an individual. Simple things like not having the funds available to travel to a mandated benefits appointment can lead to benefit sanctions, rent arrears and eviction. The Hardship Fund is a flexible fund for individuals or families experiencing crisis, destitution, or who are in immediate risk of homelessness. It can be the difference between being able to pay the rent and maintain a tenancy and being faced with eviction and homelessness.

2. Project Improvement Fund
This fund is for the benefit of residents within an established project. The transformative elements of supported care go beyond having a roof over your head and a bed to sleep in. The Project Improvement Fund is there to create a supportive environment, within which the residents can develop practical and social skills, including life skills. The Project Improvement Fund could contribute to gym equipment, the development of communal spaces, innovative social activities for multiple beneficiaries such as arts and cooking­ anything that could help rebuild confidence and develop new or improve existing skills.

3. Client Progression Fund
The Wallich has an ongoing commitment to creating opportunities for people. We recognise that training, education, and employment offer a sustainable route away from homelessness and provide the best opportunity to integrate into society. The Client Progression Fund is there to facilitate access to educational trips or courses; to provide seed funds for enterprise or to attain professional qualifications. It can be used less formally to support meaningful personally progressive activity.

Project Update
Since May 2019, when we received the funding from The Diversity Project there have been 135 successful applications across The Triple Fund totalling £25,946.

Applications to the fund have been received from a wide range of individuals and projects, demonstrating how the fund is becoming more widely recognised as an emergency funding resource across the organisation.

The grant so generously given by The Diversity Project Charity in April 2019 went towards supporting the work of the Transition Team at Treloar’s.

The Transition Team support the students at Treloar’s who are contending with the most complex physical disabilities and conditions such as learning difficulties, visual impairments, absence of verbal communication, medical and dietary issues, lack of social awareness, mental health problems and life-limiting conditions. Here is an indication of the complexity of our students’ needs:

• 94% of our students are wheelchair users;
• 80% have speech, language and communication challenges;
• 46% are non-verbal or require support from Communication equipment; and
• 20% have a life limiting condition.

The Transition Team’s work is to enable students to achieve qualifications, and gain the confidence and independence they need to move onto the next step in their lives – whether that’s continuing within the School Sixth Form, a residential placement, returning home to continue studying at a local college, or moving onto Treloar College.

Former student about the impact of Treloar’s and our Transition Team.
“Being at University has given me so many new skills that would not have been possible if I had not been at Treloar’s. I have opened so many new doors now I am doing a course I love and that is all thanks to the amazing people I have met throughout my life. I am learning how to direct in a theatrical sense and also independently help myself to live my life. Thank you for everything. Being at Treloar’s inspired me to be the person I have become, I am stronger now and more confident than when I first arrived. I am looking to get a job and being at University has stood me in good stead for this and my future career.”

Invincible Me is at a very exciting point in its journey, as we are about to launch our first proprietary programme in late February 2020. We have five schools signed on for this cohort and are very excited to start working with them, and to assessing the impact our programme can have over the four terms during which we support them. During this time we will also continue to refine the programme based on feedback from the schools and the Invincible Me facilitation team, and hope to launch our second cohort in either summer or autumn term 2020.

Background:
Invincible Me’s first programme in 2017-1018 was a joint pilot with the UCL Institute of Education (IOE). The IOE had created a knowledge exchange programme around whole school wellbeing, which seemed like a good fit for what Invincible Me wanted to roll out. The programme facilitators worked with primary school staff rather than directly with children, with an end goal of affecting positive change in mental health and wellbeing for both children and teachers.

Within the first term in the 10 pilot schools, Invincible Me facilitators and CEO realised that there were a number of ways in which the programme could potentially be more effective. These included:

a) A more practical programme; schools to be given support to identify the issues in their particular school and make a measurable action plan to address these issues;
b) A clear framework, audit tools, and established baseline data from which to measure changes during and after the programme;
c) An emphasis on being strategic and sustainable; the programme should not be ‘just another intervention’ but help to shift mindsets and culture across the schools.

Following on from the joint pilot and in order to make the necessary improvements to our programme before running it again, Invincible Me spent much of 2018 and spring 2019:

• Refining our audit and evaluation tools for schools and putting these online for ease of use by schools and analysis of data by Invincible Me facilitators;
• Trialling these new tools in a small subset of primary schools in London; (con’t)
• Developing an initial set of evaluation materials including case studies, videos and testimonials to share with potential schools;
• Putting in place a GDPR compliant database to track the schools we have/ hope to work with, past and future funders, potential delivery partners and other Invincible Me supporters