We work with at-risk 11–24-year-olds delivering person centred support based on their individual needs. Most young people we see have one or more of the following challenges: mental health, care experienced, at risk of or involved in offending behaviour or at risk of exploitation.
Your support means working with one young person for 1-2 hours a week, to support them in taking the next steps in their life. This will be a combination of support through messaging/ calling / video calling and meeting up in the community.
Our team will support you to do this. Each Youth Support Coordinator is responsible for 25-30 volunteers and 25 young people. We also have a Volunteer Coordinator and an Operations Director, so there is always somebody available when you need them.
Volunteering with Caudwell Youth
Learn about volunteering at Caudwell Youth from our short video.
How it works
Please complete the enquiry form below.
A member of our team will contact you within 3 working days.
We’ll arrange an informal interview with you, typically online.
Following the interview, we’ll ask you to complete an online DBS form and submit 2 references.
Whilst we wait for your DBS to come back, we’ll arrange 2 training sessions with you, including safeguarding.
Once trained and DBS checked, we’ll match you with a young person! This can take some time as all matches are young person centred; we’ll keep you up to date with our progress.
Please consider that we currently operate in Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Luton, Milton Keynes & Berkshire.
Our commitments to each other
From you…
Please always:
Ask us for support if you need it.
Keep us up to date with your matched young person via our app or website using our contact logs.
Support us in our surveys, 3 times a year, about your matched young person’s progress.
Be an ambassador for Caudwell Youth and get involved in our volunteer activities.
To you…
We will always:
Value you as part of the Caudwell Youth team.
By mentoring with us, you’re joining a community of local mentors.
Train you to work with young people.
Support you, when you need it; we pride ourselves on being flexible.
Have a safeguarding lead on hand to support you and your young person when emergencies happen.
A mentoring story
Meet Sam (20) and Mentor Jack from Luton. Sam has learning difficulties and came to us struggling to make friends and become independent. He is at college and volunteers once a week at a youth centre, since starting to work with us Jack has worked with Sam to build his social confidence and resulted in a trial shift for part time work. They both love computing and Jack is supporting Sam to build his own pc using his knowledge.
This is just one example of how our mentoring model is person-centred, we match young people and volunteer mentors based on interests, skills and personality. This ensures the young person receives support completely tailored to them, we always keep the young person’s best interests at heart.
Update summer 2023
It’s been a great journey and Sam has come such a long way with the help of his mentor Jack. He has now moved into paid employment at a golf club and we couldn’t be prouder of his journey.
