John Lyon’s Charity (JLC) has always valued the work of organisations supporting children and young people with their mental health, awarding 219 grants totalling over £12m since 1991.
The Brent Centre for Young People (BCYP) is the leading mental health charity for young people in North West London and one of the groups known to the Charity the longest. Since 1994, JLC has awarded over £1.2m in grants to help support BCYP’s mission to improve young people’s lives through specialised treatment in the areas of suicide prevention, tackling self-harm, eating disorders, exam anxiety and more.
Since its creation, the BCYP has cemented itself as the leading provider of therapy services in the community. Its clinicians have developed talking therapies which are unique to the Centre, including Adolescent Exploratory Therapy (a talking therapy geared specifically to teens), Group Therapy for Young Offenders and Sport & Thought (a unique program using football exercises to provide group therapy to young people who have difficulty engaging with any mental health support). Currently the Centre predominantly reaches young people through 13 schools, the Youth Offending Service (YOS), in-house at the main site in North London and through other projects.
BCYP have been working with John Lyon’s Charity for over the past 25 years, starting with an initial grant of £30,000. Since starting out, the funding has provided much-needed resources to build work of the Centre, creating a sense of financial stability across their services. It has also helped to raise the organisation’s credibility with other new funders, and consequently raise additional resources to expand their reach in North London to more young people.
In the last year, the Centre has seen 819 young people come through their doors, a 36% increase in the last year proving that BCYP’s services are needed now more than ever. JLC’s core funding to BCYP helps 150-200 young people per year and has also played a major role in expanding its school’s programme into Ealing and deeper into Brent. During the pandemic alone, JLC provided £40,000 in emergency funding that allowed BCYP to enhance their intervention in schools, to create a more supportive counselling service to pupils.
“Much of our successes in reaching more young people in North London over the past 25 years through a range of therapies has been founded on JLC’s dedication to our mission”, said Dr Maxim de Sauma, BCYP Chief Executive Officer and Clinical Director. “Thanks to JLC’s support, our patients have accessed a safe space for quality therapy to work through their challenges and find a way to move forward. For this, we are tremendously grateful for working together.”
Most recently, BCYP was awarded £150,000 over three years as part of the Charity’s Home-School-Community strategy to work on the expansion of the Centre itself. Brent Centre for Young People had developed a relationship with the Institute of Psychoanalysis and the Charity is now funding BCYP to use the Institute’s premises to deliver its therapy services within the borough of Westminster. It is hoped that by working in partnership with the Institute, particularly on training and research, Brent Centre for Young People will be able to ease the growing challenges in the sector around recruitment of suitably qualified psychotherapists by targeting the five most deprived wards in the borough; Church Steet, Churchill Gardens, Harrow Road, Queen’s Park and Westbourne.
John Lyon’s Charity is committed to help support BCYP in its mission to provide help and support to young people who may not otherwise receive any, and to help young people address their difficulties at an early stage so that they can become healthier, happier adults. John Lyon’s Charity is very proud to have supported Brent Centre for Young People and to have maintained a strong partnership after all these years.