About us
The Challenge brings young people together from diverse backgrounds and throws them in at the deep end. They take on physical, social and civic challenges that prepare them to design and deliver a project that will make a difference in their community. Along the way they learn key skills such as teamwork, leadership and communication, and are encouraged to develop trust in others, responsibility for themselves, understanding and empathy.
Who we are:
The Challenge Network is the charity that designs and delivers ‘The Challenge’, inspiring young people from diverse backgrounds to come together after writing their GCSEs and make their mark in the community. The Challenge Network is a registered charity established in April 2009, with offices in London, Birmingham and Bolton. The charity is funded by a variety of private philanthropists, trusts and foundations.
Our challenge:
Our young people are struggling to come of age; they have lower levels of confidence and trust, weaker relationships and a lower sense of belonging than their contemporaries in almost all other developed countries.* The consequences on UK society can be seen in impacts on the economy, community participation, health and crime levels. There are few scalable programmes that tackle these issues by attracting and serving a broad group of young people.
Our aims:
Help 15-16 year olds understand the responsibilities of adulthood, bring them together with people of different social backgrounds and motivate them to get involved in their local communities, thereby strengthening them.
Our approach:
The way we achieve our aims is by providing intense, challenging experiences, reflection and high quality, consistent mentoring relationships.
Results to date:
In 2009-10 c.670 young people from London and Birmingham took up The Challenge, with c.95% completion of the summer programme and all teams completing their community project. The social, ethnic and gender mix was broadly representative of the local population, with c.25% participants eligible for free school meals and c.12% from independent schools. Our evaluation suggests 88% of young people who took up The Challenge agree that ‘I am more likely to get involved in my community’ and 85% agree that ‘I feel more responsible for making a difference in my local community’. Over 80% of young people who completed The Challenge signed up to volunteer with another local charity for a further 6 months at our ‘Milk Round’ events on the final day of the programme.
2011 plans:
Deliver programmes for 3240 young people from London, the Midlands and the North West, establishing three regional hubs. Our key focus is on enhancing programme quality (more challenge, more service opportunities, even more varied social mix) whilst learning how to scale and preparing to franchise. Our plan is to scale to provide programme places for tens of thousands of young people per year by 2015.
Partners:
The Challenge Network partners with a wide variety of organizations to deliver our programmes including Envision, Outward Bound Trust, BBC, The Scouts and London Youth.
