The Children’s Fund is part of a government initiative that has provided Leicester with funding of £6 million to support and develop preventive services to improve the life chances of children aged 5 to 13 who are at risk of social exclusion.

By working in partnership, Leicester Children’s Fund seeks to remove barriers to success and so help children to reach their full potential. We currently support more than 40 different projects across the city.

We work in partnership with Health Trusts, Education and Social Services departments, voluntary organisations and community groups, encouraging a whole range of services to work together to help children who need additional support. The programme team is employed by NCH, one of the UK’s leading children’s charities.

Children may be at risk of social exclusion for a number of reasons. There could be issues around poverty, racism, family circumstances, disability or poor access to facilities to give just a few examples. Through the projects we help to fund, children are offered support in a wide variety of ways. Examples include learning mentors, counselling, after school activity groups, information and advice and sports activities.

Our goal is to enable children to get the most out of their lives. With our partners, we are working towards: improving educational attendance and performance, reducing crime committed by or against children, improving children’s health and well being and improving access to services.

We also hope to involve families more in their local communities, sharing their knowledge and working together to help sustain the programme. There are opportunities for parents and carers to get involved on a local level (for example as volunteers or on management committees) and also on our own Steering Group, to help in making decisions about how Leicester Children’s Fund is run.

We strongly believe in including children in the process of planning and delivering services. We have run consultation events and involved children in staff selection, choosing who runs services, developing a web site and creating a unique logo for the Fund in Leicester.

To find out more about any of the above, please contact Leicester Children’s Fund at 25 New Walk, Leicester, LE1 6TE. Telephone 0116 249 5680, Fax 0116 255 7312 or e-mail leicesterchildrensfund@nch.org.uk