As we continue to celebrate #IWillWeek and the amazing projects young people deliver, we’re shining a spotlight on KEY+ group ‘Confidence in Conversations’. This group picked up our NCS Superstars award at The Key Awards 2024 for their phenomenal social action project.
Confidence in Conversations is a group of ambitious young people with lived experience of being a young refugee arriving in a new city. The group were empowered to take on the KEY+ Challenge to support other young people who'd recently arrived in the Newcastle, helping them to learn conversational English and explore their new home.
As we continue to celebrate #IWillWeek and the amazing projects young people deliver, we’re shining a spotlight on KEY+ group ‘Confidence in Conversations’. This group picked up our NCS Superstars award at The Key Awards 2024 for their phenomenal social action project.
Confidence in Conversations is a group of ambitious young people with lived experience of being a young refugee arriving in a new city. The group were empowered to take on the KEY+ Challenge to support other young people who'd recently arrived in the Newcastle, helping them to learn conversational English and explore their new home.
The group remembered their own experience of learning English as an additional language and the lack of support some of them received and wanted to make a change. They came up with the phenomenal idea to run an 8-week programme, tutoring young people who had recently arrived in Newcastle.
They got to work planning what they would need to make it happen, sourced an affordable and accessible venue, mapped out their session plans, pulled together a budget and pitched their idea to a KEY+ panel who were more than happy with giving the group the go ahead!
The hard work started when the group got to the 'do' step of KEY+. They reached out to local organisations supporting young refugees and invited their beneficiaries to the sessions. Each session was free to attend and the focussed on a different topic such as using public transport in Newcastle, the English school system, and even Geordie slang!
As a result, those who attended the sessions became more confident in their English skills and felt able to hold longer conversations with the group. Some of the young people benefitting had not yet received school placements, so the group provided them with revision guides, notebooks and pens to aid their learning too.
Interview with the group:
Why did you decide to take on the KEY+ Challenge and deliver a social action project?
“I wanted to give back to my community who supported me in a similar situation. I first hand have the same experience [as young refugees arriving in the city] and I know how helpful my community was and I wanted them to have the same support.” - Nuha, Confidence in Conversations group member
What did you most enjoy about your experience?
“The most enjoyable thing I did was learning different cultures because it gave me a chance to meet people from different cultures” - Jemima, Confidence in Conversations group member
“I most enjoyed cooking with everyone” - Suha, Confidence in Conversations group member
About the author
The Key