Seven young women with babies will be celebrated with friends and family on Wednesday 21 December when they received their certificates of attendance from their 12 week parenting course, at Elim Children’s Centre, Salisbury. The course is designed support young mothers with babies ranging from a few weeks to 2 years old and was run by The Learning Curve between September and December this year.
The women took part in sessions covering caring for their child, developing parenting skills, planning and cooking for a healthy lifestyle and budgeting. The course aims to inspire young mothers to both get a good grounding in the essentials of parenting as well as to consider their longer term career objectives, focussing on identifying skills and opportunities for development that ensure they are best placed to progress into employment or further education.
Elim Children’s Centre, which is managed by the children’s charity, Spurgeons, were approached by The Learning Curve, and in partnership they ran the course. This was in response to the latest teenage pregnancy rates which show that parts of Salisbury have the highest rate of teenage conceptions in Wiltshire. The feedback from the women showed how far they had come during the course. One participant commented ‘I didn’t know there was so much to the cooking – especially the food prep.’ The women also learned the value of supporting one another and helping each other out when a friend was struggling.
Alison Wray, Head of Centres for Spurgeons in Salisbury said ‘I am delighted that these women will be receiving their certificates and celebrating their success. I was so impressed with the way that they prioritised the course and showed such great commitment in coming every week. It was wonderful to see them making friends and supporting one another, especially as, now the course has ended, we will offering them the opportunity to set up a regular coffee morning so that they can continue to meet together socially. We also hope to invite other young women with children to join them so that they can benefit from this support too.’
