My Experience with Covid-19 in 2020

No doubt, the effects of the pandemic are already taking a devastating toll on millions of people, from the workforce to the economy. The youth are especially vulnerable to the pandemic due to the rapid societal shifts being witnessed currently. As the younger generation around the world are being asked to learn remotely through digital tools, access to education has become challenging, making the stark digital divide in education more apparent.

The lack of support for students during this unprecedented time as come as a surprise for all, me included. During the first lockdown, the closure of schools nationwide, my experiences in and of the pandemic allowed me to develop new skills and but also important life lessons, typically not learnt in a classroom. Learning new life skills, particularly personal selfcare, mental resilience, effective communication skills, planning and prioritising my college workload and work commitments, means I’m less fazed by new surprises or uncertainties. Therefore, I’m able to rely more on my own initiative, this is something I’m grateful for.

The cuts to youth provisions, particularly the closure or reduction of youth mental health services needs to be evaluated. Many young people have experienced a hike in mental pressures causing them to deal with this on their own and feeling alone, amid the urgency of the pandemic. We now need to refocus our attention on mental health support and care for young people to ensure the impact of the pandemic on children and youth people can be eased.

It's safe to say that we have been glued to our devices, be it to catch up with the demand of our schoolwork, or simply keeping track of the virus panic the media has created. While the use of laptops and iPads were once a pastime luxury, they are now an educational necessity that not all can afford. This has led to severe inequalities within the UK education system which has in the past, although adapted well for many, continues to neglect those from BAME and poorer backgrounds.

As an A-level student currently doing four demanding A-levels, I often struggle to find the time to socialise with my family members as I’m bombarded with work glued to my workspace constantly trying to meet my deadlines for assignments, it can come as a task to find the time and mental energy in a day to catch up with my family. So despite all our countless setbacks caused by Covid-19, I am also grateful for: the little extra sleep I can get and mentally prepare myself with in the morning before an online lesson, and being around my family members throughout the full day in the comfort of our home.

Covid-19 has truly taken its devastating toll on society. But among all the chaos of lockdown, social movements such as Black Lives Matters has gained more prominence after the devastating deaths of countless lives through police brutality, all of which we watched from our screens in shock.

What has brought some peace to this unprecedented storm? Well, social media platforms such as TikTok were prevalent, and with the troubles of coronavirus still lurking, social media allowed millions to show support from inside their homes, uniting society universally; in supporting key workers, the NHS, those who have lost a loved one to the virus and has started the journey toward solidarity, against racism and police brutality. So, what off returning to normal, in embracing a new normal? Highly unlikely, but there’s no harm in a new obstacle for society to collectively overcome.

Luqman Osman is a student at London Academy of Excellence in Tottenham and a Youth Club Officer at RISE Projects.

Community organisations join forces to help stop the rise of COVID-19 in Haringey

With a new lockdown in place, groups and organisations across Haringey including RISE Projects have come together under the banner of ‘Community Protect’ to strengthen local messages about COVID-19 and to help slow the rise of coronavirus in the borough.

 This is the first time that so many groups and organisations in Haringey have joined forces to work together with a united voice, sharing essential public health messaging at a time when it is most needed.

Using their combined resources, and with financial support from Public Health in Haringey, the alliance of community groups and organisations is reaching out across all sections of Haringey’s diverse communities, ensuring that the right information gets to those most hard to reach, to help reduce health inequalities, build stronger communities and improve the quality of life of the people of Haringey.

With simple reminders about the actions we must all take to keep on protecting each other –washing hands, covering face and making space, as well as getting a test and self-isolating when necessary – the Community Protect alliance is sharing clear messages through printed media, online, through the press, in neighbourhoods and face-to-face where possible, to ensure that we are all doing the right things to protect ourselves, our communities, and our loved ones.

BBC Somali Report on Covid-19 Food Project

The fight against Covid-19 has had many different elements, with RISE Project’s community food drops being one of them. Our volunteers at RISE Projects spend their spare time every Saturday preparing food for the people most affected by the virus in Haringey and neighbouring boroughs. While we were founded to support young people and providing them with mentoring and personal development opportunities, we have had to change our work stream during Covid-19 to respond to the effect of the pandemic and its impact in the local community.  

Covid-19 has affected people who were struggling before the virus the most and has made their situations even worse. For example, according to BBC research, over 3 million people in the UK are receiving some form of benefit, with 45% of these, being recent people affected by job losses and redundancies. Covid-19 resulted in the UK has seeing it’s the worst economy in over 11 years.

RISE Projects been supporting the community to distribute essential food and household supplies in Haringey during the Covid-19 pandemic. Many of our service users have reported that they are currently facing a food crisis, made worse by children being off from school and many people losing their jobs. This has caused financial hardships on families already facing challenging circumstances.

Watch here for the short news report from the BBC Somali Service:

Food Drops to Community in Haringey

We have been working closely with the Felix Project to distribute essential food and household supplies to the community in Haringey during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Many of our service users have reported that they are currently facing a food crisis, made worse by children being off from school and many people losing their jobs. This has caused financial hardships on families already facing challenging circumstances.

We have been supporting disadvantaged people by collecting 25 crates of food every week and then redistributing this to vulnerable members of the community, especially those people who are most isolated, who are unable to afford food, unable to go to the shops or unable to support themselves during this difficult time.

Over the next couple of month, we plan to support more disadvantaged families in Haringey and to restore some hope to some of the most isolated members of our community. We are very grateful to the Felix Project, in supporting us with free food to support the community.

Mentoring with Heartlands High School

We are delighted to be working with Heartlands High School for the second year to deliver our Personal Development Mentoring Programme. Last Year’s programme was a brilliant success and this years mentoring programme will build upon on the experiences gained from last year. We will work with over 30 students, ranging from years 7-10 and will deliver the weekly mentoring programme to discuss different themes and will give students the opportunity to learn interactively using breakout group sessions.

RISE Youth Club - Turnpike Lane Launched!

The RISE Mobile Youth Club has been launched in Turnpike Lane, following successfully running in Bruce Grove since October 2019. The idea behind the mobile youth club is to engage young people in Haringey through different activities, whether its just to provide a safe space, or a place where young people can come together to play games and socialise. We run the sessions in two different sites, to ensure we are able to reach young people across Haringey.

The RISE Youth Club offers young people a regular activities they can look forward to and take part in. By creating a safe and positive environment, we have found young people are able to discuss their future plans and what they want to achieve. Some of our group discussions have in the past focused on community safety related issues such as staying safe, knife crime, anti-social behaviour, serious youth violence, as well as personal and career development discussions.

We also engage young people to use the space to take part in organised activities and games. We organise regular FIFA tournaments to enable young people to make connections and to interact with one another.

Join us the Shine Centre, in Turnpike Lane, every Friday from 6PM.

Knife Crime in the Community Conference

As part of our community engagement activities to increase the awareness of the drivers of Knife Crime in the community, we recently worked with a new organisation called Somali Speakers, which is a group of concerned community organisers who undertake outreach activities across London to spread a message of peace and dialogue on current community related issues, including knife crime.

The event was recorded by Content Over Everything, a YouTube content creator channel with over 45,000 subscribers. See below for the presentation and discussions.

RISE Youth Club Bruce Grove

RISE Projects is proud to launch a new weekly activity for young people in Haringey. The RISE Youth Club creates a safe space for young people every Tuesday evening, to engage young people through positive organised activities. We have partnered up with Haringey Youth Space, at No. 10 Bruce Grove to deliver this vital weekly activity. As part of our early intervention efforts to keep young people safe, this weekly activity is timely but also provides an added value to our youth engagement activities in Haringey.

Over the next couple of months, the RISE Youth Club will engage and support young Somali people in Haringey through mentoring and other organised activities. Creating a youth space, where young people can come, learn new skills and develop positive relationships will enable us to support 16-24 year olds in Haringey.

UCAS DAY

UCAS DAY, an annual event organised by the Inter-University Somali Societies took place on 22nd September 2019, at the Institute of Education in central London. The event was organised to support young people understand the university application process, gain useful tips from current university students and professionals on how to write a successful personal statement. The half-day event was attended by over 200 young people, majority of whom were in years 12 and 13, the latter year group will begin their UCAS application in January next year for entry for September 2020.

This year RISE Projects was a sponsor of the event and it was a great opportunity for us to do some outreach and engagement with young people from across London. Our stall was visited by many young people who had questions about how to achieve their goals, mentoring and how to get the results they need to get into their chosen university.

Visit the official UCAS website for useful tips and advice.

Rise Your Net Worth Mentoring Programme Launched

The RISE Your Net Worth Mentoring Programme is a tailored, monthly mentoring networking programme for graduates and young people with professionals to help you to develop your career goals. This innovative 6 month mentoring programme, will pair recent graduates and those who are not in education, employment or training (NEETs), with professionals to access additional professional training, employment and development opportunities starts later this month. Congrats to all those who have been selected to take part in this first round of mentoring and networking.

If you would like more information about the mentoring programme, please contact Fatima Warsame on fatima@riseprojects.org.uk

RISE Careers Event 2019

On Saturday 20th July RISE Project organised its annual careers event, where we brought together Somali professionals and graduates for our inaugural RISE Your Net Worth Careers Event.

The networking and careers event was designed for young people and professionals well established in their careers to meet, networking and to share career information and advice to access opportunities. Over a 100 people, majority of whom were young graduates, attended the event and will now take part in our innovative 6 month mentoring programme, which will pair recent graduates and those who are not in education, employment or training, with professionals and access additional employment or development opportunities.

The careers event formed part of our youth engagement in Haringey to show young people there are opportunities to develop themselves and to learn new skills and to grow their career prospects. We organised the event to also show a positive side to the Somali community in Haringey, and away from the usual negative narratives of knife crime, anti-social behaviour and involvement in serious youth violence. It was inspiring to see so many young people, parents and professionals come to the event to progress and further develop themselves as well as giving back to their community to uplift one another.

The event was also an opportunity to launch our 6 month mentoring programme, pairing young graduates and NEETs people with professionals over the next 6 months, with the view of the young people professionally developing themselves and learning from their mentors to ensure that they can access valuable opportunities, information and advice. We plan to organise monthly meetings until March 2020 for the mentors and mentees to meet up.

As well as networking, particular time was given to a panel discussion on the importance of networking and why its crucial to improve your networking skills to further increase your chances of landing key career opportunities. The panel discussion were composed of Dr. Samira Hassan, a GP and community activist, Hafsa Isse, a Marketing Manager, Amel Abshir, an Infrastructure Engineer, Awale Elmi, Director of RISE Projects and Mustafa Dugsiye, a Finance Professional.

Watch the panel discussions above on our YouTube Channel.

RISE Your Net Worth Somali Careers Event

RISE Projects presents RISE Your Net Worth Careers Event. This is an opportunity for university students and new professionals to network with established professionals.

An opportunity for university students and recent professionals to form meaningful connections with established professionals from a range of fields - from Business, Healthcare, IT, Education and Civil Service and many more. Join our conversation and build your net worth and connections to help you progress and flourish in your field.

There will also be an opportunity to engage with our professionals in a more structured setting - limited places available!

Sign up your interest to avoid disappointment. Register here on Eventbrite

RISE Director Awale Elmi on BBC News discussing Knife Crime

RISE Projects Director Awale Elmi appeared on BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire Show to discuss the disproportionality of young Somali men being fatally stabbed and the consequence of parents sending their children back to East Africa to avoid being killed, groomed or being exploited by criminal gangs involved in county-lines.

Speaking along side other Somali community leaders and professionals, Awale explained the complex reasons behind why so many young Somali men are being killed in the UK. Ahead of the studio discussion, RISE Projects worked with BBC producers to undertake a short research to analyse the number of young Somali people fatally stabbed in the UK.

Of the 100 people stabbed to death in the UK so far this, 8% were of Somali heritage. This is particularly concerning when the UK Somali population accounts for less than 0.5% at its highest estimated figure of 300,000. The high number of fatal stabbings has resulted in hundreds of British Somali teenagers are being sent by their parents to East Africa to avoid knife crime in the UK.

RISE Projects works towards reducing serious youth violence in Haringey

As part of its community engagement efforts RISE Projects recently organised a community discussion on serious youth violence with local parents and key statutory stakeholders to see how serious youth violence can be reduced within the Somali community. More than ever now, it’s become an urgent priority for a seldom heard group such as the Somali community to work closely with statutory services providers such as MPS Haringey and Haringey Council to find solutions to the problem serious youth violence and knife crime.

International Women's Day Video

As part of International Women's Day 2019, RISE Projects were fortune enough to speak to women in Haringey about their thoughts on womanhood and International Women's Day 2019.

We spoke to several entrepreneurs, to explore the importance of International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month. Here's a short video we put together of their thoughts and experiences.

RISE Projects Works with Heartland High School in Wood to mentor students

RISE Projects has recently started a new mentoring programme with Somali students at Heartlands High School in Wood Green.

The mentoring programme which will start 28th February 2019, will go on until the end of the academic year, meaning students will benefit from 15 weeks of weekly mentoring activities. We will work with two groups of students aged between 12 to 15 for 3 hours a week, working with 20 students all together.

We are very happy to invited to work with Heartlands High School, following on from our earlier success in working with other schools in Haringey. The mentoring programme is part of our Safer Schools early intervention approach to tackling serious youth violence and knife crime among young Somali students in Haringey.

Park View Academy Student completed RISE Mentoring Programme

Students from Park View Academy took part in RISE projects six-week mentoring programme for Somali boys. Boys from Years 9 and 10 were part of the Mentorship programme. They participated in six sessions covering topics on: family life, future career plans, community safety, health and well-being, mental and emotional well-being, online safety and personal development plans. The final session was a celebration, where students received their certificates.

““I can say with confidence that the students got a lot out of the personal development programme. From our first session covering successful Somali roles models to goal setting and decision making workshop, to the career development workshop, discussions on resilience, personal branding and our last workshop on community safety and knife crime.” - Awale Elmi, Director RISE Projects”

RISE Projects featured in Haringey People Magazine

RISE Projects were featured in the Haringey People Magazine for February and March’s edition. This is a really opportunity for us to showcase the work we’ve been doing to support young people in Haringey particularly around community safety. This isn’t the first time we’ve been nominated for a Community safety award. During the 2017 Haringey Impact Awards RISE Projects were highly commended in two categories including Best Newcomer Award as well as being highly commended for improving Community Safety and Environment in Haringey.

Sister's Circle - A new mentoring initiative for BAME women in Haringey launched!

The Sister’s Circle which is a new initiative by RISE Projects to engage young BAME women in Haringey to support them to improve their live outcomes through personal development, mentoring and career guidance.

The Sister’s Circle, which is targeted in working with women aged between 16-30 years is an innovative projects which seeks to create a platform for developing new skills, networking and being part of a network of peer-mentors, some of whom are well established in careers. The Sister Circle empowers women who are on the fringes of society and who face social isolation and alienation to access employment and educational pathways. Each meeting covers topical themes such as well-being, mental health, hate crime, women’s empowerment and personal development and career development. Join us to take part and look out for our next meetings on our events page and social media links.

First Meeting of the Sister Circle - 16th January 2019

RISE Project wins an Award for Community Safety and Improving the Environment

RISE Projects was a winner at annual Community Impact Awards organised by The Bridge Renewal Trust. RISE Project won a Community Impact Award for the Community Safety and Improving the Environment category.

The 2018 Haringey Community and Voluntary Sector Expo took place on the 29 November 2018 at Tottenham Town Hall. With over 700 people attending. The event was a celebration of the outstanding achievements of Haringey’s Voluntary and Community Sector. There were stalls, presentations and performances which all aimed to show some of the amazing work that goes on in Haringey.

The Community Impact Awards are given annually to grassroots community groups, voluntary organisations and schools that have combined effective community service with innovative and sustainable practices to improve the lives of Haringey residents.