Reach Out

Intergenerational Exchange

Participle creates future services with and for the public. Starting from the individual and their community, unlocking a unique set of insights and motivations, which are then applied to the problems that need to be addressed. This bottom up process of learning from and understanding individuals, and the life they want to lead, is simultaneously combined with a top down process of institutional and financial analysis which draws on Participles broad networks of academic and professional knowledge.

Reach Out brings together Participle, The Aldridge Foundation, Brighton and Hove City Council and the London Borough of Croydon. The project will design new ways to strengthen young people’s relationships with themselves and with supportive adults within Brighton and Hove, and Croydon. The goals of the project are to create new opportunities and forms of support for young people that are ‘authentic’ and dovetail with their every day lives.

Reach Out is built upon the belief that decision-makers have mistaken symptoms for problems; investing in buildings not people. Reach Out was developed in part in response to the UK’s Government’s decision to set aside £173 million pounds to build or renovate youth centres in every community. Youth centres age instantly. What is innovative today won’t be five years down the line. And even the most cutting-edge facility won’t keep young people coming back. People will.

Reach Out knows instinctively that behind every thriving young person is a personal support network, made up of a combination of parents, family members, friends, teachers, youth workers, professionals, neighbours, and community members. The question is how do we help adolescents and the people in their lives establish and maintain positive, transformative relationships? Starting with young people has given us a fresh perspective on the tenuous bond between society and its youth, and the types of services and supports required for true intergenerational exchange.

We aim to build new services that:

• Enhance youth-adult relationships
• Strengthen families; and
• Expand young people’s sense of what’s possible