Pam J Edmunds

The past year has proved to be a very pleasing one for CYCA, if somewhat challenging at times. The association continues to work to a high standard at all levels thanks to the efficiency and dedication of the staff and management team led by Tracy Pike. We continue to work in three ‘early years’ settings, holiday clubs, after school clubs, youth clubs, mentoring clubs and fishing clubs. The ‘Families in Crisis’ project is coming to an end but has proved to be an invaluable help and support to vulnerable families across the County. We are fortunate to be able to commence the new project ‘Securing Futures’ due to lottery funding and have welcomed several new and enthusiastic staff to undertake this work. My heartfelt thanks must go to all the dedicated and loyal staff who work tirelessly to ensure the children and families we care for receive the best care at all times. Many thanks to the Llanelli Star who this year have made us their charity, providing us with such welcome funds to enable us to help and guide more children and families in Carmarthenshire. Thanks to trustees Byron Jenkins and John Jenkins who have held functions at the Diplomat Hotel, again swelling our funds to sustain this work being carried out at CYCA. To Carmarthenshire County Council, Llanelli Town and Rural Councils who continue be so supportive to CYCA at all times, and to all those who have helped with funding. Finally, thank you to all the trustees who are so helpful and provide guidance, particularly to vice chair Judith Jenkins, Jan Williams and Alan Williams . We look forward to the coming year hopeful that we can continue our important work and strive to help even more children and families in Carmarthenshire.

Jan Williams

CYCA Chairperson

CYCA Wales Limited Chairperson www.cycaonline.org

Looking back over the past year, I am extremely proud of the hard work and dedication undertaken by the staff and trustees at CYCA Wales Limited. In this present economic climate, the services of CYCA Wales Limited are greatly in demand. I am delighted that we can more than meet the challenges that are presented to us. Projects such as ‘Families in Crisis’ and the ‘Mentoring Club’ now play a vital role throughout the County. Our Nursery at the Palms, ‘Little Seraphs’ continues to grow and develop. Our staff are our greatest strength and they all receive structured training to achieve their full potential. Managing such a diverse organisation is not an easy task, however in Mrs Tracy Pike together with her management team, we have the professionalism and expertise we require. More importantly, we have someone with the vision and aspiration needed to allow the organisation to grow and prosper. Thank you to the staff for making my role so pleasurable and privileged.

Association Manager CYCA and CYCA Wales Limited Tracy Pike

2012 has been a very successful year for CYCA with many accolades! We have been successful in being awarded nearly a million pounds from the BIG Lottery Fund’s ‘Improving Futures’ programme. CYCA were one of 5 successful projects from Wales in the 26 that were awarded throughout the UK, CYCA being the smallest charity to receive such a large award. The project began in June with a team of highly experienced practitioners comprising of therapists, mentors and the case workers. The project will be externally evaluated enabling CYCA to be recognised UK wide. As part of the new project, we also received £25,000 from RDP funding to research emotional health services with all ages throughout the County. This will lead to online services on a new website which will be developed in partnership with Coleg Sir Gar. CYCA have also been chosen this year as the local ‘Charity of the Year’ by Llanelli Star. They will fundraise for the charity throughout the year and continue to feature our successful stories regularly. Mike Doyle agreed to be our Ambassador this year, and Llanelli enjoyed a wonderful evening of entertainment at the Diplomat hotel, joined by Morriston Big Band. Dominos pizzas sponsored the event as well the Diplomat Best Western Hotel. Our early years services, after school clubs and holiday clubs continue to provide exceptional services for thousands of children every year, providing a safe environment for children to play and learn. ‘Families in Crisis’ funding ends in May 2013 with over 300 families having received counselling or therapeutic support. All this successful work could not be achieved without the hard work and determination from all the employees of CYCA. The Trustees board also play an essential role in offering support and advice to ensure we continue to work ethically and professionally at all levels. I offer heartfelt thanks to everyone who plays a part. As funding becomes more difficult to access for day to day operating costs at CYCA, local support has never been so crucial, and I am very grateful to local trusts, Carmarthenshire County Council and local businesses for their continued support.

Diolch yn fawr iawn.

At CYCA, we continue to offer support and services to children and their families across Carmarthenshire. From nurseries and play clubs to youth initiatives and therapeutic support for families, we are able to nurture and support the community from birth to adulthood! Our services are delivered by a highly trained and dedicated team who contribute enormously to our success. With skills and experience in the fields of play, childcare, youth work and counselling, staff are led by a management team with over 30 years experience, ensuring children and their families receive the best possible services. We continuously strive to offer exciting and innovative services, embracing new technology and media to engage with young people and their families. This was highlighted in particular this year as we have began the process of developing an innovative ‘virtual support gateway’. This will enable children and adults to access online information and support, which will supplement the hands on ‘face to face’ work we have done over the years. Many of our publically funded projects are aimed at particular children and families who are in need of various support, however our general services can be accessed by everyone. So take a look at our varied and stimulating range of services over the next few pages, and f you would like to become part of the ‘CYCA experience’, simply get in touch with us to see how we can help you and your family.

www.cycaonline.org

This year yet again proved to be a very exciting one for our three nursery settings - Jellitoz, Little Seraphs and Teddybears, each continuing to thrive, delivering stimulating care and education for children in preparation for the big step up to primary school. During the year, Jellitotz have truly settled into their new home at Morfa school by taking part in a variety of joint initiatives with the school, family centre and local community groups. These include, a joint sponsored ‘bounce’ with Morfa Family Centre, where they raised £265.00 for Sport Relief, regular visits to the community funded ‘Morfa Spray & Play’, and a visit from ‘Arts for All’, where the children helped decorate the corridor leading into the nursery. Other highlights at Jellitotz included the installation of ‘forest phones’ in the outdoor play area, growing and cooking their own vegetables, a nature walk, and the children’s favourite - numerous ‘messy play’ sessions! Our private nursery, Little Seraphs has been working on an exciting project throughout the year - Hywel Dda Healthy and Sustainable Pre School Scheme, where they worked towards achieving awards by promoting and providing good practice such as healthy eating, the physical and emotional well being of children’s development and learning within the daily routine of the nursery and parents via ‘home links’. Throughout the year, the nursery has continued work in partnership with local agencies and projects providing crèche facilities for children while parents attended training courses. By the end of the year, there were 16 children registered with the nursery, with the baby unit full to capacity and the toddler unit numbers steadily increasing over the year. At Teddybears, children, staff and parents were treated to a visit from the local fire service, complete with fire engine! Fire fighters spoke to the children and parents about the dangers of hot appliances around the home before the children had the opportunity to dress up in firefighter uniform, before going outside to sit inside the fire engine and to help spray water from the hose pipes. Other highlights included growing their own vegetables and the ever popular Easter Bonnet parade. As well as celebrating regular themes and occasions such as Halloween, Christmas, St David's Day and Easter, all three nurseries also celebrated the year’s special events in their own unique way, by staging their very own ‘Mini Olympics’ and parties to celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee! Also, they were all visited by special guests including ‘Zoolab’ where the brave children had the chance to handle snakes, spider and rats!

www.cycaonline.org

Our children and play services enjoyed another successful year, with our after school and holiday clubs proving to be as popular as ever. Our main holiday club at our Dewi Sant Centre was yet again full to capacity during every school holiday, as children, both old and new were treated to an array of exciting and fun activities, which included healthy cooking, drum sessions, skateboarding and arts and crafts. The summer club celebrated the London 2012 Olympics by designing special posters as well as staging their very own ‘Mini Olympics’. This year we ran five successful after school clubs in the Llanelli area, namely Dewi Sant Play Centre, Ysgol Y Bryn, Ysgol Brynteg, Ysgol Ffwrnes and our latest after school club at the new Ysgol Maes Y Morfa, which has been a great success within the local Community. Over the course of the year, the after school clubs took part in a wide range of activities, including arts and craft, den building, skateboarding, fundraising, trips and sports days. Our Play Officer, Kath Bowen ensures that all of our clubs operate to a high standard and that all staff receive the required training and support, allowing them to provide a stimulating, high quality service for children.

Throughout the year we continued to provide a range of initiatives for the young people of

Carmarthenshire.

It was all change at our regular Dewi Sant Youth Club, with leader, Jamie Pike leaving to take up a

role as a Police Officer in Llanelli. We are extremely grateful for the work he has done over recent

years to develop the club and are proud that he has used his skills and experiences with us to gain

such a valuable position within the community. Jamie was replaced by Dave Bennett, who has

continued the good work of developing the club as one of most successful and productive throughout

the County. The club’s highlight of the year was the creation of a new ‘Graffiti Wall’ at the back of our

Dewi Sant Centre. All the young people got involved and had the opportunity to put their own ideas

on the design.

Over the course of the year, we further developed our OwnZone initiative within secondary schools,

providing a host of after school activities. Pupils at Bryngwyn have continued to benefit from the

scheme, taking part in fishing clubs, skateboarding clubs, scooter clubs, aromatherapy &

massage sessions, street dance classes and cheerleading workshops. During the year, St John

Lloyd school have got involved with the scheme, where we have established two fishing clubs and

have staged aromatherapy sessions and massage classes.

Our Angling Participation project has continued to go

from strength to strength. During the year, we have

continued to run a number of clubs within Llanelli,

whilst we have also developed our first club within

Carmarthen, at Richmond Park School. The project

has again enjoyed national and international success

with several of our members representing Wales at

international competitions. As well as our dedicated

and experienced coaches, throughout this year we

have fostered and developed new peer coaches who

have acted as mentors to the other young people

who attend.

As well as our support for children and young people, many of our services involve all family members. Over the year, parents have had the opportunity to take in a variety of activities both with and without their children. These have included weekly family cooking workshops at the beginning of the year and also regular parent and child activities through our three nurseries. We have also gone out to the community to deliver a variety of training workshops to local mums with young children. This year was the second year of the Big Lottery funded Project, ‘Families in Crisis’. This service seeks to provide support to families who are managing high levels of distress and trauma. The support is geared to ‘wrap around’ the family recognising the overwhelming impact on all parties involved. The skills and diversity of the team, allows the interventions offered to be based on the needs identified by the families, and other involved agencies. These interventions can include individual counselling, play therapy for children, couples work and a mentoring programme to support and develop young people for whom life can be difficult. Central to the work is an understanding of the impact of trauma, the development of coping strategies and support systems and a belief in the empowerment of the client, however young or old they may be. Thus, the earlier we are able to implement support the greater the effect on positive change. Key to this work is the belief in the family unit and in the capacity of each individual to find their own way forward, whilst supporting a way to stay as a family unit. During the second year of the project the team have worked tirelessly to offer support to 67 families with upwards of 130 individual clients accessing the service. The complexity of life for the families involved, means that the support offered must seek to not only provide a level of stabilising support at a time of great uncertainty, but further look to affect long term change, supporting the family to return to a place of strength and cohesion. The team offer compassion, understanding, respect and absolute admiration, recognising how hard it can be for families to ask for help. The aim is to continue to work on behalf of families on a daily basis but also on a wider level to seek to voice the issues and concerns that they have and to hope to affect change within services and the local community.

www.cycaonline.org

2012 saw the introduction of our new Big Lottery funded project called ‘Securing Futures’. The aim of the project is to provide early intervention and support to families in the Carmarthenshire area. The project works with families that have no statutory service involvement. The four year project began in May and pilot families were taken on during June and July. The team has also spent time training and introducing the project to partners such as Flying Start, Genesis, Health Visitors, and People’s First.

The criteria for the project is that the eldest child is aged between 5 and 10, with the parents experiencing difficulty understanding new or difficult information, learning new skills, coping independently with everyday activities or interacting with other people. Alternatively, they could be feeling tense, anxious or nervous. The Securing Futures team consists of a Case Manager, Family Support Officer, Family Systemic Therapist, Child Play Therapist and Mentors. The team listen to families and create a plan based on their needs. A therapist and mentor are then allocated to the family, to encourage activities between the parent and child, develop self help strategies, and provide advice and guidance. The team also signpost to appropriate services currently available in the area and assist individuals to access them. As part of the project a ‘Virtual Online Support Gateway’ will also be developed, which will provide families with a host of interactive online support. The gateway will be developed with the support from the Rural Development Fund who have funded the research and initial set up phases. This support allowed the team to carry out extensive research with family and youth groups throughout the County, which will allow the content of the gateway and its digital tools to be as informative and relevant to its target audience as possible. This innovative initiative will be launched in the spring of 2013. The Securing Futures project is supported by the Children’s Partnership, Carmarthenshire County Council, CBSA and Coleg Sir Gar, TAF and local schools.

www.cycaonline.org

Through various projects and services we have continued to offer a valuable mentoring service to children and young people throughout the County. We have continued to run weekly ‘mentoring’ clubs at our Palms Centre, where young people have the opportunity to take part in a variety of activities such as healthy cooking, music sessions, aromatherapy and massage sessions and help with homework activities. Also, at the end of the year, the young people under the guidance of staff have began to develop their own ‘blog’ giving them the opportunity to express their views on a variety of topics. Mentoring is also a vital part of our Big Lottery projects, ‘Families in Crisis’ and ‘Securing Futures’, where a team of highly skilled and dedicated mentors, provide a vital service for children and young people. Over a set period of time, mentors work on a ‘one-to-one’ basis with the children and young people, offering them guidance, advice and support on issues such as building self-esteem, self-confidence, self-awareness, self-worth, motivation and goal setting. The sessions, usually involve taking part in a variety of stimulating activities, teaching a variety of life skills or promoting physical health. These include, cooking, art & craft, music, digital media and sporting activities. The mentors are given guidance and support from the projects’ Case Managers, and are advised on the work they do by a small team of therapists, which include a Family Therapist and a Play Therapist.

This year through our CYCA Wales Limited service, we have further developed our training programme offering a service that seeks to support the needs of professionals, parents and children and young people alike. We have focussed on an area that we know to be crucial in the emotional health and well being of children and young people, that of ‘Attachment’. A ten week programme was offered and designed for Foster Carers, Trainee Social Workers, Third Sector workers, Health and Education, focussing on childhood trauma and the impact on attachment. The training explored the work of pioneers such as ‘Bowlby’ but also more recent approaches such as the experiential work of Dan Hughes. Throughout the ten weeks the belief was to understand what children and young people’s behaviour tells us so that we are better placed to support them. Strategies exploring active listening, the role of the play therapist, life story and its impact were explored and discussed with a group rich in experience and ideas. The trainees on the course, were asked to complete a reflective journal, case study and small pieces of written work to make sure that the learning offered had been clear and engaging. At the end of the ten weeks the feedback from the group was 100% positive in terms of relevance, course delivery and content. The only criticism being that a longer course would have been good, so we are already developing the ideas for the next course. We have also offered a specific course to meet the needs of mentors looking at issues within the work such as boundaries, child protection, therapeutic interventions, working with families, communication skills and the necessity of Supervision. This training underpins all the work that the mentors within CYCA offer across all the projects within the service.

Finally we have taken training back into the community working closely on a

structured programme with a local primary school to deliver support, guidance

and where possible empowerment to mums of young children. This course

focussed on offering positive coping strategies based on a CBT framework as

well as looking at the difficulties that occur as a parent thus building up a

group that could go on to support each other. This has been so successful

that two of the original group have gone on to become ‘Mentor Mums’ offering

support to other mums in the local community.

Designed By Matthew Newbold

Carmarthenshire Youth & Children’s Association, Dewi Sant Centre, Nevill Street,

Llanelli, Carmarthenshire, SA15 2RS

Tel: 01554 757599 support@cycaonline.org

Registered Charity No 512720