Katies Story at the Eden Gate Centre in Newport
20 November 2023
As a company we work hard to collaborate with our communities. In this blog find out more about the work of our Innovative Water Resilient Communities Project in Newport - and the way that it seeks to have an extra impact to help customers to overcome challenges.
Background
The Water Resilient Communities Project is all about a values-led, place-based approach to work with communities across the whole range of support that we offer – to inspire resilient communities.
It involves meaningful collaboration, heightened presence and a deep understanding of the challenges facing customers within the area. In Newport, this meant working with over twenty groups and organisations - from community centres to housing associations, homeless centres to schools. Bolstered further by the support of the social enterprise Grow Social Capital, The Co-production Network for Wales, and Business in the Community, the project has really benefited from an increased purposefulness in its’ community work.
The project also encourages an innovative approach. For example:
How do you support customers who are dealing with debt in the area?
For us, we took our debt advisors out of the call centre and into the community centre, helping to offer support and build trust through word of mouth. The result?
“I’m really nervous on the phone. I just came down, and the gentleman has helped me out. I’m just trying to sort my life out. Times are hard. Everything is getting on top of me lately. As long as I keep up with my new tariff payment, the arrears will be written off.”
How do you ensure that future generations develop a breadth of skills, knowledge, and inspire future interest in the utilities industry?
For us, it involves taking our education team into classrooms to deliver bespoke, practical, hands-on workshops. The result?
“Using those little microscopes, I looked at a dragonfly – it had a really long tail and big eyes!”
How do you raise aspirations, and help tackle unemployment?
For us, it involves working with work coaches from the local job centres, delivering employability workshops that lead to real opportunities within the company. The result?
“It has given me a lot of background that I wouldn’t have had before. I have much more knowledge to be able to apply for a job.”
Striking a partnership with the Eden Gate Centre in Newport
“There are some challenges that are not quite as obvious to us on occasions. Literacy is a big one - people don’t like telling you they can’t read.”
When we spoke to the Operations Manager of the Eden Gate Homeless Centre in Newport, following an introduction through BITC (Business in the Community), several points gave pause for thought. The opportunity to be involved in helping their guests to help themselves, was extremely worthwhile.
As we developed this unlikely partnership, the extent to which we could help centre guests to overcome barriers, became more apparent.
Taking a joined-up approach, we offered vulnerable customer surgeries, water efficiency audits, community funding (for a well-being garden), and adult literacy sessions. The latter was co-produced for citizen involvement, and delivered collaboratively with the Literacy Trust to ensure as much impact as possible. For centre guests, this really meant something.
Our Community Tells its’ Own Story: Supporting Katie
“I missed out, as a child, on a lot. So this is what I really need. Give me a book, I’ll struggle.”
As told by our partners at the Eden Gate Centre, Katie, 33, is a guest and regular attendee. After becoming homeless, Katie and her partner began attending Eden Gate and got involved with the both the drop in and the Shoulder 2 Shoulder programme. With her love of animals, especially cats, Katie was keen to involve herself with the practical farm sessions run in partnership with the All Creatures Great and Small animal sanctuary. Katie also helped with the Eden Gate Front Garden project, where guests, supported by the staff, landscaped a small piece of land to the front of the centre.
Having seen the benefits of personal engagement and wanting to make positive changes to her life, Katie began to participate in many of the projects, enjoying and benefiting from the social interactions and friendships formed as a result.
In July 2023, with the support of Dŵr Cymru and The National Literacy Trust, Eden Gate began running weekly literacy skills sessions for guests who wanted to improve their reading and writing skills. Katie signed up to take part, a key motivation for this being her desire to sit the driving theory test; the first step to her owning and driving a car, something she has been keen to do for some time now.
Katie has greatly benefited from the one-to-one support received from the trained teachers volunteering their time from Dwr Cymru and, as a result, her reading skills and confidence have greatly improved over the sessions. Her progress has been noted by the teachers, Eden Gate staff and most importantly by Katie herself. Her increased confidence led to Katie booking a driving theory test in November 2023 which we are delighted to confirm that she passed with flying colours. She is keen to continue building on her successes and is encouraging others to be inspired to take a similar approach.
Katie has faced a number of trials throughout her life and although she is still on a journey of self-development, her decision to get involved in the Eden Gate Shoulder to Shoulder programme has been a positive step forward, especially in developing her literacy skills.
Eden Gate is keen to go further by also providing guests with similar help with numeracy skills development via a combination of workbook-based and practical sessions learning, such as shopping and budgeting.
This case study illustrates how working with an individual such as Katie to form positive experiences while gaining practical knowledge can have a huge impact and assist a person in their self-development. It also shows what can be achieved through the medium of effective partnership working to achieve common goals.
Katie summed it up; “I am so grateful to Eden Gate and in particular Education Team from Dwr Cymru and Sarah from the Literacy Trust, who have really helped me. I would like to thank them for their support and patience. They listened to me and took the time to understand my difficulties with learning and reading. I hope that others will decide to get involved when they’re ready”.
For Dŵr Cymru, the Water Resilient Communities Project puts the spotlight on making the most meaningful of differences to people, and the learning that we can take from that - in everything we do. We are now looking forward with excitement at the next focus areas for this project.