Shaftesbury Youth Club is offering a Four week exciting Summer Club consisting of:

Dedicated Art Programme run by Professional Artists - Adam Bresnen and Katrina Price

Specially Tailored Guitar Course for Level 1 or above, run by Persian Guitar Maestro - Mohammad Nejati

Media Production and Design Course 12 -16, Taught by Graphic designers and Media Production assistants - Philip Tsang and Kerri-Ann Burson

Fun Sports and Games club, Football, Cricket, Rounders and other Activities

Starting from:

Monday 25th July - Friday 19th August 2011 10 am till 3 pm £40 a week or £10 a Day - Ages 8yrs -16yrs Canteen on site - £2 for Dinner Breakfast Club Drop off 9am Additional £2 Late Pick up £3 - 5PM

Contact us for details:

0151 608 7165 Shaftesbury Youth Club - 60 Mendip Road Prenton - Birkenhead - CH42 8NU deborahdav@hotmail.com

We continue to offer courses in the daytime to support young people from local schools with a flexible curriculum that is difficult to provide in mainstream education. We work in partnership with several Wirral secondary schools. Our open " Shaftes Academy " staff are qualified tutors and most also serve as youth workers in the evening.

Our courses are all accredited and currently include studies in exercise, sports and leisure, creative arts, substance misuse awareness Shaftes relaxed and friendly fair approach. because of the smaller class sizes and our staffs understanding of the special needs of some of these young people we are able to help a warm and welcoming environment which for some of the students is a new experience of education. We provide a hot meal at lunchtime ably catered for by our brilliant cook and her assistant.

The income we receive from these courses has been of crucial importance in enabling us to employ so many members of staff, to improve and develop our premisses and to support the range of evenings and other activities on offer for our young members. The core staff have worked tirelessly to build up the range of courses whilst maintaining quality in the essential work of the youth club. We don't no whether or not the current government intends to keep funding outreach courses in this way but are well aware that in this climate of cuts to services to young people our ability to continue to offer such a variety and quality of experiences depends.

Shaftes will be participating in an initiative design to improve inclusion for young people with special needs who because of difficulty of access, isolation and in some cases, learning difficulties, do not participate in every day youth club activities. each of he four youth hubs in Wirral supported by the aiming high scheme, will be hosting special open April when all our activities plus extras on the night, will be open to these young people.

Phil Nugent our club manager is very attuned to the difficulties faced by children with special needs and although he is very supportive of this initiative wishes that these one of events could lead to regular attendance by more young people from this group. This would necessitate for example, reliable and regular transport which is currently not available.

The club and some local unemployed local people have been mutual beneficiaries of this government scheme which pays the minimum wage for 30 hours of employment a week for a 6 month period.

Thanks to this scheme, the club is able to offer them 6 months of employment and they intern have significantly enhanced what we are able to offer both to our members as activities but also to the efficient running and maintenance of the building and the grounds. They have worked in activities that we either do not have sufficient staff for or do not have the skills that many of these people posses.

Several of these workers have training and skills in specialised areas, such as; graphic design, technology and music, but have not been able to find long term employment. It is a great pity that the current government will be closing this scheme at the end of 2011.