Urban Uprising are delighted to announce that with recent funding, received from Comic Relief, we are preparing to launch our new Repeat sessions! This will allow anyone who has completed our 10-week Climb course to attend drop-in sessions at their local wall. Explaining the importance of our Repeat sessions, our Project Coordinator, Ben Campbell, said “We work with groups for 10 weeks and at the end of it, some might have the means to keep climbing and developing personally, but often that’s not the case. This funding will allow us to keep that relationship and development going.”
How did we celebrate this news? With not one, but two radio features! Here’s a little run down of our team’s busy day!
As Comic Relief invited Urban Uprising to attend the Glasgow leg of Sport Relief’s Dare2Tri Challenge, Ben joined Jo Whiley, Reverend Kate Bottley and Richie Anderson for a section of their 10km run. While waiting for the group to arrive, Ben got chatting to journalist Richard Baynes. As it so happens, Richard is a keen climber and asked to record a segment on Urban Uprising. In the clip aired on BBC Scotland’s The Friday Afternoon Show, Ben talks about why climbing can help disadvantaged young people, saying “Climbing is a unique sport which deals with fear, confidence and resilience. Those things are critical for personal development.” You can listen to the segment at 27 minutes here.
After running with the Dare2Tri team, Ben joined up with our Session Volunteer, Sean Mills, and 13 year old Ewan, who is currently taking part in our Climb Programme. Together, they were interviewed by Jo Whiley on her BBC Radio 2 show which you can listen to here, at 38 minutes.
Ewan is part of West Lothian Council’s Inclusion and Wellbeing Service (IWS) and has been responding brilliantly to his weekly climbing sessions. Despite being a little nervous at first, he was a natural on the radio! When asked by Jo what he enjoys about climbing, he explained how it makes him feel free as well as helping him build relationships at school. This is something that the staff from IWS have also noticed within the group as a whole, saying, “Through working together, a number of young people who find school a challenge, are absolutely thriving and finding a real focus and purpose through climbing. The biggest impact observed by the teachers working with the young people is their improved social skills, especially for those individuals with ADHD and ASD.”
Speaking about his radio debut, Ewan said “Best night ever – I’d love to go back and do it all again!”
We’d like to say a huge thank you to the everyone involved in the day, to Comic Relief for giving us the opportunity to launch our Repeat sessions and to the Corra Foundation for all their support with the funding process.
If you are obsessed with climbing and want disadvantaged young people to experience the benefits, we would be hugely grateful for all donations.
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