Dec
01
2016
Charity of the Year 2016: Social Mobility Foundation
Guest blog from the Centre’s charity of the Year 2016, the Social Mobility Foundation.
The Social Mobility Foundation (SMF) is a small charity which aims to make a practical improvement in social mobility for young people from low-income backgrounds. We support students who have the academic ability to flourish in top universities and professions but lack the encouragement, confidence and networks to help them get there.
Students on our programme are offered mentoring, internships, university application support and skills development workshops. Once students reach university they are given further support to help participants obtain graduate-level employment.
Helping us with our journey
We were incredibly excited when selected as the Centre’s Charity of the Year and the timing couldn’t have been more perfect as the training would support our journey to become a national charity and help more students across the country. The support from the Centre has enabled staff from across the country to not only focus on their professional development areas but also attend training courses to help improve and enhance current activity, processes and develop further opportunities for students by enhancing relationships with our volunteers, employers, and teachers.
The follow-up service and the opportunity to meet people from a wide range of organisations on the training courses has been invaluable to us, it has enabled us to learn from other people’s experiences, as well as the experience and expertise from the trainer in that field. The staff at the Centre are always so friendly and welcoming, and the environment and is always a supportive one. This has ensured we get as much from the training as we possibly can.
This year, we supported over 1200 students, delivered over 140 events and worked with more than 1500 volunteers across the country. We’d like to say a huge thank you to the Centre and we are extremely grateful for all the training and support this year in helping us with our journey.
What our team thought
Ayesha, Mentoring Coordinator
“The Training the trainer course was really useful in understanding how to approach putting together a training programme. The course gave practical advice which we were able to practise putting into action and we were also given the opportunity to apply it to our own roles and needs which was extremely useful. It was useful to meet other attendees and hear about their experiences as well.”
Samantha, Employer Relations Officer (North West)
“As someone new to writing newsletters, the Email newsletters and e-bulletins course was really valuable. It really made me think about the audience I am writing for, and the content they want to see. The course definitely made me think about my writing style and the changes I needed to make to suit the way people read online content.The course identified key guidelines that I have been able to share with my colleagues, in particular how to apply an ‘inverted pyramid’ structure to writing e-news articles.”
Charlynn, Programme Coordinator
“I attended a two-day Training the trainer course at the Centre. Having the course over two days allowed us to learn the theory and put it into practice. It also allowed us to ask questions and share ideas. I found the content of the course very informative and the exercises very stimulating. We were also given a book to take away which has been shared in our office!”
Joanne, Undergraduate Programme Coordinator
“I attended a one-day Report writing training course at the Centre earlier this year. The course went above and beyond my expectations. The content was thorough and well-delivered, and the trainer was engaging, supportive and clear. What I especially liked about the course was how practical it was – the trainer constantly brought theory back to real-life examples from our day-to-day work which made taking what I’d learned and applying it back in the office really easy. The follow-up has also been great – we were given very useful resources to take away, and I have since used these several times and been able to introduce them to colleagues. I also contacted the Centre with a question relating to the course a few months later and they were able to help me straight away. I have been to the Centre for a few other training days and consistently been blown away by the environment there. The staff are incredibly friendly; the space is calm and very comfortable; and everything seems set up to make the experience really enjoyable and fun (even down to the mid-afternoon ice cream break!) I can honestly say I have never enjoyed training courses quite as much as those at the Centre – it’s always the highlight of my week!”
Are you a registered charity with a turnover of £3m per annum or less? Would you and your colleagues benefit from the extensive range of management, communication and administration training offered by the Centre? If so, the Centre's Charity of the Year award 2017 could be for you.
If selected as our Charity of the Year you can expect to receive up to 24 days of free training throughout the course of the year with a value of up to £7,000.
For further information regarding selection criteria along with an application form please contact us by email or call 020 7490 3030
Closing date for applications is 5pm Wednesday 14th December 2016.
