Derby Summer Promise – a free summer activity programme available for young people
Published: 13 July 2021
children drawing
Derby City Council is delighted to announce the launch of the £1.5m ‘Derby Summer Promise’, a city-wide programme providing an exciting summer of enriching and learning activities for children and financial support for families and households in an all-inclusive programme.
The Derby Summer Promise is primarily built around national funding from the Holiday Activities and Food programme (HAF) and the Local Support Summer Grant which has been used in connection with partners to develop a fantastic programme of providers and support.
Parents and carers throughout Derby may be eligible to benefit from a free holiday clubs programme for children and young people over the school summer break
The Summer Promise, aims to provide activities, ranging from sports, to cooking and performing, to thousands of children in Derby who are eligible for benefits-related free school meals and has approved more than a dozen local and national organisations to run free holiday activity clubs to enable children and young people to enjoy fun activities with friends and learn and develop new skills.
It will also include a range of exciting summer activities for younger and older disabled people across the city, including horse riding, cinema trips, gardening skills, arts and crafts all delivered by local organisations skilled and experienced in supporting this group of residents.
The new summer support grant of £860,000 will also provide financial support to families currently receiving free school meals. This will be distributed directly by schools and includes support for those year six’s moving up to year seven for new school uniform.
The HAF programmed, which was launched in the city during the Easter holidays, is supported by a national investment of £220m, of which the city budget is £700,000. This will support the provision of free ‘holiday club’ places for thousands of children between 5 and 16 during the summer and Christmas 2021 school holidays
More details on the activities and how to sign up to will be available on the Council website in the coming days.
Councillor Evonne Williams, Cabinet Member for Children and Schools said:
We’re committed to improving the health and wellbeing of all our children and so we’re delighted to be launching the Derby Summer Promise, which will provide activities and healthy meals to eligible children and young people as well as financial support for those most in need.
We’ve worked hard to put together a great range of activities for children across the school ages which we’ll be announcing details in the days ahead.