Children and young people

Unprecedented rise in children being prescribed anti-depressants

9 March 2016, Isabella Goldie

The World Health Organisation has raised concerns about an unprecedented rise in the number of children being prescribed anti-depressants in UK.

Mental Health Foundation highlights the importance of children’s mental health with #MindsMatter

8 March 2016,

As the Friends of the Foundation host a gala dinner to raise much needed funds for the Mental Health Foundation’s work with children and young people, a preventative approach to mental health problems in childhood has never been more needed.

Jade's story: 'I could see no way out'

Jade experienced bullying at school, which led to depression, anxiety and wanting to end her life.

Right Here Sheffield

Right Here Sheffield was led by YMCA White Rose.

Right Here Newham

Right Here Newham was led by New Choices for Youth Trust (NCYT), a generic youth organisation based in the London Borough of Newham with a history of working on training and development.

Right Here Fermanagh

The Right Here partnership in Fermanagh was led by established youth charity YouthAction Northern Ireland . The partnership included senior representatives from the Youth Service, Education, Healthy Living Centres, Mental Health, and Public Health. The place Fermanagh in Northern Ireland has a population of approximately 55,000, with Enniskillen as its county town. It is a mainly rural county bordering on the Republic of Ireland with a majority Catholic population. The county has experienced over 30 years of conflict, particularly in border villages, leading to fragile communities and...

Right Here Brighton and Hove

Right Here Brighton and Hove was a partnership led by Sussex Central YMCA (now YMCA Downslink Group), along with Mind in Brighton and Hove and Brighton and Hove City Council’s Children and Families Services.

What do young people's services mean to young people?

Mark Brown from Social Spider reflects on the findings of a small research study into what young people felt about their involvement in the Right Here programme. What happens if you begin to capture what a mental health and wellbeing project means in the context of people’s lives? Right Here, the national five-year £6 million Paul Hamlyn Foundation/Mental Health Foundation initiative to develop new approaches to supporting the mental health and wellbeing of young people aged 16-25 did just that. The Institute for Voluntary Action Research (IVAR) carried out the process of evaluation of Right...

How can the development of youth work-led mental health and wellbeing projects be supported?

What Right Here learnt about creating, funding, managing, evaluating, and nurturing effective youth work-led mental health and wellbeing projects. Right Here was a young people’s mental health and wellbeing programme developed and managed by Paul Hamlyn Foundation and the Mental Health Foundation that ran from 2009 to 2014. It funded four local partnerships – in Brighton and Hove, Fermanagh, the London Borough of Newham, and Sheffield – which worked with young people to co-produce and deliver a range of mental health and wellbeing activities, projects, research and opportunities. The...

How do we build partnerships to bring youth work & mental health together?

How honest and sustained relationships are the key to effective partnerships. Traditional wisdom for funders suggests that encouraging and supporting partnership bids from voluntary sector organisations can help to ensure that hoped-for outcomes are delivered. The assumption is that voluntary sector organisations in a town, city or region will be able to achieve more if they can work together and with statutory partners, particularly if the ambition is to change local practice and policy. In 2009, when Paul Hamlyn Foundation and the Mental Health Foundation set in motion the five-year Right...