It’s two years since I joined go Beyond as Chief Executive. Needless to say, a lot has changed in that time. The world feels a very different place. No longer locked down or cautiously re-connecting (the month I joined was the first time we were allowed to stay overnight away from our own homes), but there is the devastating war in Ukraine, spiraling inflation and the soaring cost of living which is impacting so many families.
No wonder, then, that we have seen demand for our breaks rise exponentially.
I was drawn to this charity for its very simple offer: to give children a break from difficult lives. In over 20 years of working with children and families, I’ve seen how difficult life can be. I was lucky enough to be taken on holiday in the UK most years as a child, often to stay with family in different parts of the country. I’ve taken my own children away on holiday too.
I’m fortunate to know the joy of having a break, of exploring somewhere new, meeting new people, trying new things. You don’t have to go very far to put those everyday worries behind you, just for a few days. And, like so many people, I enjoy escaping to the seaside or the countryside.
Go Beyond delivers exactly that experience week in week out, for literally hundreds of children, in Cornwall and in the Peak District.
It does that again now, but it wasn’t doing that two years ago when I joined! By the Summer of 2021 the pandemic had taken its toll. The charity had been reduced to providing day breaks for small groups of children visiting just one of our centres. Everything else was moth-balled: Staff were furloughed, bedrooms and play areas shut, funds had drastically reduced. On top of this, the change of brand from Chicks to Go Beyond had happened right at the start of 2020 – just as the pandemic was about to sweep the world and close everything down.
We re-emerged fighting. I like a challenge! Our few remaining staff stepped up to delivering residential breaks within my first month. We dusted off the policies, spruced up the centres, made fresh beds, and cut the grass. And the children came back. Slowly at first, as we battled with continuing Covid and last-minute cancellations. There was understandably some nervousness, but it didn’t last long.
By the end of October 21, we had reopened our second property, Daleside, in the Peak District. It took an enormous effort to wake everything back up: freshening up the facilities, welcoming back returning staff and recruiting new people. Everyone driven to one mission: to give children a break.
We saw children who hadn’t had a chance to stay away from home before. Many had fallen behind with their schoolwork, they were nervous making friends. Quite a few had experienced bereavement. All the same things adults across the UK had experienced but these were young children and some of them had the weight of the worlds on their small shoulders.
Young carers have come to us in great numbers, both those who are known to care for someone else in the family but many whose role maybe isn’t realised by the ‘authorities’: children who tell us they get their brothers and sisters to bed at night, children who cook meals and tidy the house, children who worry about money and what things cost. No wonder they look so anxious. No wonder we are worried about their mental health.
Over the course of 2022 we saw the effects of the pandemic and the rising cost of living with more and more children being referred. My target of 500 children coming on a break was well and truly smashed with a total of 777 children. We saw the money starting to come back in, thanks to the sterling efforts of a fledgling fundraising team and some truly wonderful supporters who shared our vision.
I was drawn to Go Beyond because I wanted to give them a chance just to be children. Those simple things like having a good home-cooked meal, reading a bed-time story, running freely outside are things many of us who are more fortunate, have taken for granted.
That’s the vision that has got me up every morning for the past two years!
We’ve done lots of other things too: I’ve really wanted to understand the difference we can make in just a few days away from home. Consistently collecting data every week has given us some rich insights, coupled with an academic-led review of 10 years of evidence from the charity’s archives. We know we can help children build their confidence, improve their communication skills, and learn new skills because they have told us so, in their own words. It isn’t enough just to be able to see the difference we’re making, we have to be able to prove it.
As a charity CEO it’s a case of being in charge, but also rolling up your sleeves and getting stuck in, plugging gaps, being on the ‘shop floor’. Over my two years I’ve cooked, cleaned, gardened, put up curtains, driven the minibuses, raised funds, spoken to donors, spoken on national and local radio and appointed a fantastic team. I’m proud of every single one of them.
The children who come to us are aged just 8 to 13, sometimes older. Our volunteers are all ages from their teens to their seventies. It has been a privilege to meet so many over my two years. I probably enjoy mealtimes the best, sitting alongside a child on a Monday teatime who is nervous about what’s to come and where they’re going to sleep, through to the end of the week when they are smiling and full of stories about the fun they’ve had. You learn a lot from sharing a meal with people, children have talked about life at home, their hopes, and fears, in a very natural way and I carry all those memories with me.
It’s probably too soon to be certain of the impact of the pandemic on young lives but from what I’ve seen, some things are very clear: far fewer of our children can swim than was the case before 2020. Even those who live near the coast don’t go to the beach. Over three quarters qualify for a free school meal, and we see they are hungry. Our referral agents, often someone from school or a social worker, have told us of social isolation, and anxiety. I’ve seen that with my own eyes.
So, what next? Well, the charity celebrated 30 years last year and I see my role as setting it on a strong course for at least the next 30 years. I have a simple aim of wanting to leave it better than I found it! That means more children – and this year we are on course to outperform last year. I want us to be more targeted, seeking out children who need a break the most. I’d like us to build ever-stronger partnerships with our network of referrers and with like-minded organisations.
I’m also determined to keep improving the quality of our breaks – by making every single child feel truly welcomed to some of the loveliest places in the country, investing in better games, securing some fantastic donations of toys and toiletries, replacing old bedding with comfortable new mattresses, and brightening up our rooms we have made our breaks better. There’s still more we can do.
I’m also determined to do our bit for the environment. We owe that to our children. In 2022, we sold our third property in Devon which had become a drain on our precious resources and would have been too costly to restore. Instead, we have the beginnings of a capital fund, and we are exploring remodelling both centres to create more capacity, and less energy-intensive spaces. As custodians of over 70 acres of countryside, I want us to plant trees, create trails, open up ponds and streams for play and exploration.
This is all captured in the five-year strategy that was approved by Trustees in November last year. Now, with an expert board in place to provide good governance, and an expert team in place to deliver, we are ready to embrace the future. We’ve promised to provide 5,000 breaks over five years. That’s a big ambition but I have every confidence we will do it.
It will take time. There is plenty to do. The last two years have been challenging, exciting, daunting, fun. Nearly 1,500 breaks have been provided in that time and that’s something to be proud of. But it’s just the start. Just watch this space!
Michele
