Legacy
London is a diverse city rich in culture, with countless museums, galleries, music venues and eateries on our doorstep. We want to make sure that older people who live here get the same benefit from all of the wonderful things our city has to offer, and we have some very exciting trips lined up in the next few weeks.
Monday marked the 12th Day of Christmas and the end of the festive season. NLC volunteers have been busy returning to the homes of the older people who were part of our Christmas project in which we decorated Christmas trees, delivered hampers and helped spread a little festive cheer to older people who were alone at Christmas.
We hope 2014 will be a big year for North London Cares, with untold exciting new projects, activities and partnerships - helping us to help you support our older neighbours in lots of new ways.
In the 28 months since North London Cares launched, 654 young volunteers have hosted 312 Social Clubs, adding 7,061 new volunteer hours to their communities, supporting over 700 older people, and creating 19,526 interactions across generations and long-standing social divides.
This is North London Cares Annual Report for 2012/2013. It contains information about our vision, background, projects, methods, fundraising, people, finance, governance, partnerships and our plans for the future. Please read it, share it with your networks and get in touch if you have any questions or suggestions. We'd love to hear from you as we think about next steps and plan for the future.
This winter, as we have done for the last two years, North London Cares is delivering a special campaign to help keep our older neighbours warm, active, connected and healthy.
Technology workshops, cooking, film clubs, discussion groups, local business and Parliament trips, afternoon tea, care home visits, signing and dancing and gardening... This is just a snapshot of everything our wonderful volunteers have been getting up to in the past two weeks, and there is so much more to come in the run-up to Christmas.
I couldn't be more excited to be joining the North London Cares family. My Nan has always been my role model in life - I've learnt so much listening to her stories, helping her cook and watching her adopt anyone in need of a hot meal and a slice of cake! To find a role where I get to work daily with my older neighbours is such a huge privilege and I can't wait to get stuck in!
We know that many older people in the community feel anxious about the pace of modern life, and the changes brought about by big business, globalisation and gentrification. But we also know we have lots of great firms in north London doing fascinating things. Our job at North London Cares is to connect those two worlds - so we thought why not take a gang of older neighbours to visit one of the companies working right on our doorstep...
As well as our regular social clubs that bring young people and older people together over shared interests such as music, food or film, our volunteers pop in to see their older neighbours who are lonely and isolated to provide a bit of support and companionship. As winter nears, we want to make sure our older neighbours aren't alone.