This is part of our Spotlight series, shining a light on the work happening across KLS.
This month, meet Nadine, a member of our staff team who leads the Future Foundations programme at Katherine Low Settlement, supporting children, young people and their families from a refugee background.
“We’re just trying to open up opportunities so people can see themselves and feel strong enough to deal with the barriers they’re facing.”
“I’m Nadine. I lead the Future Foundations programme at Katherine Low Settlement. I’ve been at KLS for about fifteen years now. I started as a youth worker doing three or four hours a week, left and came back a few times, and after managing the youth team I’ve been running the whole programme for two years.
A day I always remember is when two young girls arrived from Ethiopia, referred to us by a social worker. Their mother had died in Ethiopia and they were joining their father, who worked long hours, so I was doing casework and youth work at the same time.
I met them in Asda in Clapham Junction with money for their school uniforms. We spent three or four hours together buying uniforms and school resources. They couldn’t speak English, I couldn’t speak Tigrinya, but it was such a beautiful time with them. They were so excited and happy to start school and have a home. After that they joined the youth clubs and the homework clubs and grew in confidence. One of them is at university now.
We have a casework team, an educational mentoring programme, homework clubs, youth clubs, study clubs and community learning, where parents learn English through ESOL classes.
We’re just trying to open up opportunities so people can see themselves and feel strong enough to deal with the barriers they’re facing. At a very practical level, a parent who’s scared to speak to their child’s teacher might get help from the casework team, or from their child’s mentor, or learn the vocabulary they need through community learning to feel confident enough to have that conversation themselves.
It’s not usual for a charity programme to work across a whole family like we do. A three-year-old can be in our free crèche, one of their siblings can be at homework club or have a mentor, and their parent can be in community learning or visiting our casework team. Something came up recently in a beginner English class because the person felt safe enough in that classroom to speak about it. The teacher passed the issue straight to the casework team, who supported them with it, and one of the younger children in that family has since been referred for a mentor.
There’s a clear focus on education across everything we do – it gives children that confidence and a more equal footing when they start at school. We tried running a youth club that was just for fun once, but the parents weren’t keen at all – what they wanted was help with schoolwork. So we kept that model, with an hour of fun added at the end.
This summer we ran trips and activities for over 74 children and young people, including a boat trip to Greenwich for twenty-five young people – over an hour on the water, the park, pizza, football, Uno. Two young people who’d just arrived in the country came along, and the others were so welcoming, helping them settle in and feel included. It gave me so much energy and made me laugh all day.
Our work can be really hard – there’s a lot of demand, and some of what our members go through is difficult to hear. Sometimes all we can do is listen and give them a safe space. But the relationships we build are genuine, and the young people benefit so much – they’re so positive, they want to learn, and our youth ambassadors love volunteering. The team really think about the reality of people’s lives and how best to support them, and that’s what keeps us all going.
This academic year we’ve got new literacy classes starting in community learning and three new team members joining us. We’re expanding our offer and improving volunteer training.
We all try our best to make our support meaningful, rather than just sort of numbers on paper.”
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