On Friday the 19th of February at 1pm we will celebrate Care Day to raise awareness of Children in Care and those with Care Experience. Please join us for our Care Day celebration, including the launch of our new, collectively authored book Taking Hold of Our Heritage. This book has been created by care experienced young people to tell the stories of their lives.
Care Day is the world’s largest celebration of the rights of children and young people with care experience.
At Leicestershire Cares we are striving towards a Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland where children and young people who have overcome adversities are proud of themselves, their achievements and look forward to a future of opportunity, equality and equity.
Care Day is an opportunity to unite in celebrating the rights and resilience of care experienced children and young people, their stories and their achievements.
At the Care Day celebration, you will hear extracts from our new book read by the young people involved and have your opportunity to ask questions in a live Q&A.
We will also have the chance to hear about some other amazing achievements of our care experienced young people over the past year.
Friday 19 February at 1pm
More about Taking Hold of Our Heritage
This book project gave the narrative power back to care experienced young people so they can tell the stories they want heard about their lives. Care experienced young people are often required to talk about their traumatic past to professionals, support services and sometimes their peers. Telling the same stories over and over again can start to imprint on their identity and heritage. Young people in care often move several times which can result in photographs and family keepsakes being misplaced and lost.
This project aimed to encourage care experienced young people to reflect on positive memories to change the narrative they tell about their lives, and recreate their own heritage artefacts. In this book, care experienced young people have investigated the complex nature of their identity through this project and produced an archive of artefacts including oral histories, art and photovoice.
The young people have investigated the memories and experiences of Leicestershire’s leaving care community, by looking at themselves, but also interviewing and documenting other care experienced young people’s lives.
Our work with care experienced young people
- Find out about the work we do with care experienced young people: mental wellbeing, employment and training, campaigning for Care Leavers rights, building social connection.
- Sign our Promise to Care
- Hear the voices of care experienced young people in our Podcasts
- Taking Hold of Our Heritage
For more information about our Voices project and work with care experienced young people, please contact jacob@leicestershirecares.co.uk