The Gannochy Trust Youth Panel has awarded 22 grants worth £112,000 since it was set up in April 2023.
The Youth Panel consists of 12 young people from across Perth and Kinross who meet four times a year to assess applications and make funding decisions. The Youth Fund provides grants of up to £10,000 for charities working with young people aged 11 to 26 in Perth and Kinross.
The purpose of the fund is to support and develop youth activity, provide a voice for young people and improve their health and wellbeing. Young people must be involved in the process of identifying the need for activities and the more involvement they have in writing the application, the better.
In its first year, the Youth Panel assessed 26 applications with over 95% receiving full funding. Successful applicants include Perth and Kinross Countryside Trust, who used their grant to set up a Youth Council; Perth Autism Support, who have been funded to support their own Youth Voice Panel and Bertha Community Hub who received funding to set up lunch time and evening drop in facilities for young people.
Any registered charity working with young people in Perth and Kinross can apply for Gannochy Trust Youth Panel funding, including holders of a Gannochy Trust mainstream grant. Applications can be made for 100% of the project costs.
Andy Duncan, Chief Executive, The Gannochy Trust said:
‘We set up the Youth Panel in 2023 to provide a platform where young people had a voice and could make a real difference in their community. We are delighted that over £100,000 has been awarded to help young people across Perth and Kinross to realise their own ideas for projects that can help them and others. There are no better people to identify and understand youth needs than young people themselves, and we look forward to seeing which projects the panel supports in the future.’
Quote from one of the Youth Panel grant beneficiaries, YMCA Tayside:
‘The YGames event this year was great fun. We welcomed around 90 young people and staff from eight different organisations for the competition. We had laser clay pigeon shooting, axe throwing, combat archery, rounders, and an inflatable assault course. These would not all have been affordable without the grant received. It also allowed for more partnership working, building our relationship with the partner organisations and activity providers.’
For more information, please visit gannochytrust.org.uk or https://rb.gy/y1qcp3