Latest News

Samaritans at the Gathering

Samaritans was at The Gathering in June 2008 and it was a successful 2 days of raising awareness of what we do amongst our voluntary sector peers and members of the public, and making useful contacts for the future.

Requests for our emotional health cards, requests for us to be involved in training for social care staff, and 10 potential volunteer enquiries meant our time was well spent.

The Gathering was also hosting CIVICUS, the international citizenship event, and so we event passed on our details to several overseas delegates who were interested in Befrienders International.

Networking is always good fun but it is difficult to guage how much real use it will be; but we talked to representatives of over 40 organisations and over 30 business cards were taken from the stand which may bring some more interest as the weeks go by.

STUC Youth Conference

Samaritans had a stand at the STUC Youth Conference in Perth in June and it was really inspiring to see and hear these motivated and very well informed young people debate the issues of the day around education, apprenticeships, and local income tax. They showed considerable interest in the information on our table (and the lollipops went down well) and they asked very good questions about volunteering and what we are all about.

From the event Samaritans have the opportunity to work with the NUS on their new project to try to improve the emotional well-being of students and to ensure that students have access to appropriate emotional support whilst they are studying.

24:7 in Scotland

This July, we are running a volunteer recruitment campaign again, focusing on finding potential volunteers who are particularly interested in working in the evening and overnights. We have received funding from the Scottish Samaritans Trust to fund a TV advertising campaign which is being backed up by an outside Ad trailer in the central belt and newspaper adverts in all other areas of Scotland.

In addition we are running a PR feature on 24:7 volunteering with one of our national papers picking up an exclusive offer and we hope that we see the numbers of potential volunteers rise as a result. Job Centre Plus in Paisley have asked us to put a table in their call centre to inform staff about what we do. This is a great opportunity as one of the key agencies who work with distressed and stressed people on a day to day basis.

Last year we saw over 200 additional volunteer enquiries for the period following 24:7 campaign and we are hoping for a similar success this year.

Samaritans with Stagecoach Promote Emotional Well-being

Stagecoach have funded a new resource for Scotland to help to improve the emotional wellbeing of the Scottish population: our Emotional Health Check Card. This small card, based on Samaritans emotional health scale, has been designed to be easily accessible to all, and encourages people to think about their emotional wellbeing on a day to day basis and to spot when an upset is becoming a crisis in order to seek help.

This new resource has been distributed widely across Scotland, and is available for any individual or organisation who thinks it would be of use to them or someone they know.

For supplies of this card, or for more information about our work in Scotland, please contact f.simpson@samaritans.org.

 

DEAL Roll Out in Scotland

Jamie McJimpsey, Service Support Officer for Scotland has been working with a small team of volunteers to ensure that schools in Scotland are aware of and know how to make best use of the DEAL pack with their pupils.  Jamie and his team have targeted key professionals in Fife and Highlands to  offer training on the materials and to establish links with local schools with and on behalf of the local branches.

This is the start of a systematic roll out of DEAL across Scotland, and we hope that by the end of March 2009 we will have been in touch with every local authority in Scotland raising awareness of DEAL and our wider work in schools.

 

Samaritans in Scotland and our work in prisons

Samaritans and the Scottish Prison Service are working together to improve the scope and scale of our listener support schemes in Scottish prisons.  A recent joint event between our 2 organisations galvanised activity around training and awareness raising, and has heralded a renewed commitment to the services at all levels.

As part of this new effort, we are working together to produce a training DVD for potential listeners and those who need support, funded by SPS via the funding they give the Scottish Region and we hope to have the DVD ready later this year.

Another important new development for us is working with Families Outside to develop and deliver joint training to new prison staff. 

http://www.familiesoutside.org.uk/

 

Survey of Scottish Branches

We have completed our survey of all our Scottish branches to find out what our needs are in terms of volunteers and other resources, and to gather together good practice to share with each other.  We consulted around one-third of our volunteers (300) which is the most comprehensive survey we have ever carried out.

Read the survey summary

 

Volunteer Recruitment Drive

Our survey tells us quite clearly that our priority for the next year has to be volunteer recruitment.  We not only require around 300 additional volunteers to carry out all the tasks we need to do, but we also need volunteers who are prepared to work in our communities, giving talks, helping with fund-raising, publicising our service and promoting our links with other agencies.

If you would like to volunteer for Samaritans, you can contact your local branch, submit your enquiry here or e-mail j.mcjimpsey@samaritans.org

Outreach Work in Scotland

Schools

Many of our branches are working in schools to raise awareness of emotional health, the importance of talking about feelings and to give out information about our services and how to contact Samaritans.  Your local branch will be able to tell you what their local programme of activity is, and how they can contribute to your curriculum.

In addition, we are currently starting a roll out of the DEAL schools pack across Scotland to ensure that schools are aware of this Samaritans resource, and have the appropriate support to be able to make use of it with their students.

Find out more about DEAL

In some areas, we have assisted pupils and staff to explore the option of peer listening services, and peer support.

For more information about our work in schools and how we can help you, contact j.mcjimpsey@samaritans.org

Work In Prisons

Samaritans supports every Scottish prison by training prisoners to be listeners for other prisoners.  Listeners offer the same confidential, non-judgemental service to their fellow prisoners as Samaritans do in the wider community, and they are supported by regular visits by Samaritans to the prison.

Samaritans also received funding from the Scottish Prison Service to offer support to prisoners on release.

Health Professionals

We are currently piloting some work setting up referral protocols with health professionals in Perth with a team of GP practices.  Our aim is to work with primary health care staff to encourage them to identify patients who need emotional support and who would benefit from being contacted by Samaritans and being offered the opportunity to talk to a trained Samaritan volunteer.

This is a new development in Scotland and we are aiming to work with other authorities, and also with other professionals in the care sector – either statutory or voluntary services.

If you are interested in finding out more about our work with health professionals, please contact  j.mcjimpsey@samaritans.org

External Training Directory

Businesses and agencies in Scotland can access our range of training courses which can be tailored to your agency and your needs. Our External Training Team can develop and provide courses for your staff, or there are now opportunities for staff to attend our new Open Courses, which aim to bring together staff from a variety of agencies to work together.

If it is difficult for your staff to get away for the day, we have a CD-Rom for Managers which provides maximum flexibility.