ESTABLISHED over ten years ago, the YEHA Project has gone from strength to strength in helping young people in North Belfast.
Based in the Flax Centre and the Houben Centre in Ardoyne, YEHA stands for Youth, Education, Health and Advice.
The YEHA Project is made up of a small dedicated team of five full-time staff, sessional workers and a team of volunteers. One such youth worker is 24-year-old Cara O’Kane, who has been involved with YEHA Project for four years.
Speaking to the North Belfast News, Cara explained more about the work of YEHA Project.
“The YEHA Project supports young people in North Belfast aged 12 to 24 to tackle issues affecting their health and emotional well being,” she said.
“Our work with young people embraces the core principles of youth work with therapeutic approaches.
“Basically, we were set up over ten years ago to tackle health inequalities in North Belfast.
“Our focus is on trying to get young people to focus on healthy lifestyles and make positive and healthy choices regarding their wellbeing.
“We do a lot of mentoring and support work where a young person would work with a youth worker informally centered around mental health and wellbeing. This may involve building coping skills and strategies for any difficulties they are facing in their life and looking at their interests and skills.
“We want young people more involved in the community and activities instead of just going home after school as well.
“It is about getting them out and about and giving them opportunities to try different things
“We have had fantastic feedback from the young people themselves about the work that we do. They are testament to the work that they do themselves with our projects.
“Our projects are all voluntary and everything is in the young person’s hands. Sometimes you have to step out of your comfort zone but the benefits are massive.
The YEHA Project is also involved with cross-community work, alongside an organisation based on the Woodvale called Streetbeat Youth Project.
Another successful project is the Carezone in Schools project, a pilot programme which is currently into its second year, based at Mercy College.
Cara explained: “It is a model where we run one-to-one support within the school and have someone from YEHA project in the school daily to work with students in school.
“After running a research programme, we found that over 83 per cent of young people would be more likely to speak to another young person about their problems rather than an adult.
“We run the one-to-one mentoring service alongside a Peer Mentor programme where young people are trained up in Peer Mentoring to help support other young people on issues affecting their mental health and enables them to signpost to relevant support agencies.
“It was a successful first year and last year we delivered 162 sessions to 33 pupils covering a range of issues including building coping skills and resilience, relationships, communication and social skills, health and well-being and anxiety.
“We have a nice room in Mercy College where young people can come and relax and they are more likely to open up in such an environment.
“It is all voluntary too, of course.”
One young person, who took part in the programme, Jodie Shevlin, praised the benefits of it during the pressures of school exams.
“The Carezone in Schools project is a way for pupils to distress and escape from the pressure of school work and exam,” she said.
“The one-to-one work the project does is a chance for us to get worries or problems off our chest and be able to just have a more relaxed chat where we are really listened to.
“It has really helped me get through my last few years of school.”
YEHA Project
Flax Centre
Ardoyne Avenue
Belfast BT17 7DA
Tel: 028 90 757 809
