We are thrilled and delighted that the Youth Agency has been awarded the LGBT Gold Charter by LGBT Youth Scotland.
The LGBT Gold Charter recognises commitment to LGBT rights and equality along with excellence in best practice. The Youth Agency are honoured to be the first youth work organisation in Edinburgh to receive this award.
In 2018 we became the first youth work organisation in South West Edinburgh to achieve the Bronze Charter. Achieving this award was a big event for us and a recognition of our commitment to fully embracing LBGT rights and promoting equality. However, we thought we could do more and go further and that is what we set out to do.
Our journey to gold began in 2022 and the 18 months we have spent working towards this award has been both enlightening and challenging. While it has been heartening to see what we do well receive recognition, we have also been pushed to be better.
Among the highlights have been working with our partner agencies to complete the Trans Top Tips document, delivering multi-agency training with LGBT Youth Scotland, Healthy Respect and LAYC to promote LGBT-inclusive practice, and participating in the fantastic Youth Pride Zone as part of the Edinburgh Pride Festival.
Feeback from LGBT Youth Scotland said “Your organisation has worked really hard over the Charter Journey to integrate inclusivity into your service, benefitting LGBTQ+ service users and staff. This is a collective effort and every person who has completed training, attended events, and participated in the journey should be proud of their positive contribution.”
We hope our services reflect the journey that we have been on, the lessons that we have learned and the relationships we have built. Ultimately, it is our wish that our staff, volunteers and all the young people using Youth Agency services feel safe, valued and free to be themselves.
Personal Achievement Award
The Youth Agency was so pleased to participate in the first ever Forrester High Shool virtual award ceremony last week and we were even more delighted to present the Youth Agency Award for Personal Achievement to S6 pupil Jason Howie. We do, of course, celebrate all of the young people...
A Little Round-Up!
As we all know it’s been a challenging, strange and confusing time recently. Like everyone, we here at the Youth Agency have been busy adjusting and adapting but we want to reassure everyone that we are very much here, doing what we do and helping to support the young people...
Comfort Packs Available
The Youth Agency has comfort packs available to any local young people and families who need them. The packs contain essential hygiene products such as shampoo, toothpaste, toothbrushes, deodorant and sanitary products. We will begin distributing these packs from the Youth Agency office on Dumbryden Drive on Wednesday 15 April...
Close Shave for Staff
Two of our staff members, Val and Francine, are sporting new super short new hairstyles this week. After being sponsored last week to shave their heads Val and Francine have, to date, raised £2,390 for the Youth Agency. Thank you so much to everyone who donated; your support is massively...
Thank you Asda!
A huge thank you to staff at the Asda Straiton store for their support this week. At the Youth Agency we are committed to supporting young people and their families through this difficult time. When it became apparent that some families were struggling to get a variety of hygiene products...
Virtual Drop-In
We’re adding to our virtual drop-ins. Our senior drop-in will go ahead as usual. Please see below for details of our junior and intermediate drop-ins. As ever, please contact us if you need more information – Facebook and Twitter details are on the poster or email info@youthagency.co.uk...
Work During the Coronavirus Outbreak
Like most of us, Youth Agency staff are physically distancing themselves from others BUT we are working from home. Our one to one support service is continuing remotely using a combination of video messaging, telephone calls and messages. Our staff have been in touch with young people who currently use...
LIFT gym collection
A huge and heartfelt thanks to the managers, staff and members of LIFT gym in Chesser for choosing to support the Youth Agency throughout February. With the enthusiastic support of staff, the members of LIFT gym collected box loads of essential toiletries for us to pass on to those in...
Purple Friday and Rainbow Pancakes
What do you do when Pancake Day happens to be the same week as Purple Friday? Well, here at the Youth Agency that means breaking out our purple photobooth and making rainbow pancakes of course! We had a fantastic week last week dressing up in...
Sexual health work and more
It’s been a busy start to the new year and the new term here at the Youth Agency. All of our groups have been back up and running for several weeks now and, thanks to the hard work of the young people involved, are making real progress. We’ve also been...
Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas and a happy new year to one and all from everyone at the Youth Agency. We look forward to 2020 and sharing our news and adventures with you...
Festive frolics
The Pyramid was full of festive fun and merry mayhem this week as our Christmas parties took place. Our younger group enjoyed lots of fun party games but with a festive twist including musical elves, pass the stocking and pin the carrot on the snowman. Our older groups had a...
Beginning to look like Christmas
As the song says, it’s the most wonderful time of the year and we have had a wonderful time over the last few weeks celebrating Christmas here at the Youth Agency. We’ve enjoyed Christmas parties with all of our groups in school, decorating trees, playing our favourite festive games and...
Sexual Health Work with S5’s
It’s been a busy few months but we love what we do here at the Youth Agency. We have just completed a block of sexual health work in Forrester High School with all of the amazing S5 pupils. After feedback from the pupils about what they felt they wanted to...
MVP in school
Our Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) sessions finished in Forrester High School last week. We have so much admiration for our amazing S6 MVP mentors. After weeks of preparation, planning and hard work they successfully delivered MVP sessions to all S1 pupils in school. These sessions focused on bullying and...
Health Drop-in at WHEC
We are delighted to be in Wester Hailes Education Centre every Thursday to support WHEC pupils. Since August we have been running a health drop-in for pupils. These take place at lunchtime in the reading room and offer information, advice and signposting on a whole range of health related topics...
Explosive Science Festival Fun
We always have fun at the Pyramid but this week has been even more exciting than usual as we welcomed our wonderful and talented friends from the Edinburgh Science Festival. They paid a visit to our junior club to whizz us through some amazing science experiments. We learned how to...
S6 Sexual Health
We’ve just completed an 8 week block of sexual health work with S6 pupils from Forrester High School. This work covered a whole range of topics including healthy relationships, risk taking behaviour, STIs and contraception designed to keep young people informed and safe. We worked hard to cement the knowledge...
