Volunteers Training Up Youngsters Looking For Work

Around 50 islanders aged between 15 and 18 will be trained up by St John Ambulance Jersey volunteers to help them get into work.

The 'Jersey Health Citizens Programme' will run for one year to help youngsters who are finding it difficult to get employed, particularly given the impact of the pandemic.

The project includes mental health training.

The Standard Chartered Foundation has donated £20,000 to run this programme.

The volunteers are working with the Youth Service, Jersey Probation, States of Jersey Police and Mind Jersey to find the right youngsters who will benefit the most from it.

"We hope this programme will encourage young people who might not have thought about being involved with St John Ambulance to join the programme.

We'll look at those issues and hopefully give them some confidence and skills that they can use to get themselves employed.

In the last few months, we've been doing the background work to make sure that we get out to as many kids as we possibly can.

We will develop a recruitment process for those young people who aren't currently involved with St John's (Ambulance), but we think would benefit from the activity that this programme can give them." - Sarah Harman, St John Ambulance Jersey CEO.

Staff who work for Standard Chartered can donate their time to those youngsters by mentoring, sharing their skills and expertise, and giving them an insight into what the world of work is like.