PACT needs your help!
PACT needs your help!
Watch this video about important PACT updates, our funding and our future.
Last year was busy for us at PACT but we are currently in a situation where our funding is reducing and this could have an impact on our staff team and capacity. We need your help to plan for the future so join one of our Zoom listenings to share your thoughts about PACT, details below.
We need your help to plan for the future
We want to hear your voice at our Zoom listening events. We are a parent-led project for parents and want to know how we can improve our project and work together.
Join us at one of these events and share your ideas.
Friday, March 19:
- Mom Space 10:30 - 11:30 a.m., contact Kate 07821 447526
- Mom Space 11:00 - 12:00 noon, contact Grace 07561 070518
Monday, March 22:
- Babies - Space Mom 11:00 - 12:00 noon, contact Mena 07534 727316
Tuesday, March 23:
- In Spanish without appointment 1 pm - 2 pm
- In English without an appointment from 6pm to 7pm
Wednesday, March 24:
- English without appointment 1 pm - 2 pm
- In Spanish without an appointment from 6pm to 7pm
Looking back at 2020
2020 was a difficult year for all of us at PACT. With confinement, we closed our face-to-face groups, moved on to online groups, and tried to find the best ways we could support our community.
10 PACT parents and volunteers accepted the challenge as community researchers and called 299 PACT families to better understand the biggest challenges affecting our community.
The biggest challenges during confinement:
- There were concerns about our children, their basic needs, such as food and rent, and the management of the Covid-19 were not met.
- There were multiple barriers that prevented families from accessing much-needed services, including language barriers, the ability to use the Internet, and access to devices.
- Due to multiple external pressures, many families experienced mental health problems, such as stress, anxiety and isolation.
PACT's Response
We received funding to hire two new team members to provide digital support, focus on mental health, and provide personalized support and advocacy to families in need.
We provided Internet and devices for 46 families who needed them and offered personalized digital support to 65 families through our team of dedicated digital volunteers.
We have been amazed by the support from our community who have continued to offer their time to volunteers and support others. With resilience and creativity, they have taught weekly English lessons, tutored PACT children during the summer holidays, held art workshops, walking tours and cooking lessons.
There's going to be some changes
We are now in a situation where money has run out and it is proving difficult to maintain our level of funding before the pandemic. We will have to reduce the capacity of our staff and we need to prioritize what we continue to do and how to do better.
This will reduce our capacity, however, we're not going anywhere. We will continue to run our groups and we look forward to opening our face-to-face groups as soon as possible.
While there will be changes, this is an opportunity to strengthen our community and decide together how we will move forward.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact a PACT staff member.