Series of Events to celebrate 10 years of Young Hackney
Hackney Council will be celebrating ten years of its pioneering Young Hackney youth service, with a series of special events, including a circus themed fun day, track cycling, a play day and many more activities, kicking off from the first week of the summer holidays in July.
Young Hackney launched in September 2011 aiming to help all of Hackney’s young people to enjoy their youth, and become independent and successful adults. Highlights include launching a dedicated sports unit in 2012 the year of the London Olympic and Paralympic Games, opening Hackney’s Forest Road Youth Hub and renovating the Parkside Youth Club, later renamed The Edge Youth Hub.
Young Hackney has continued to offer a flexible service, despite the pandemic, launching a virtual youth hub in response to the Coronavirus pandemic and reaching out to young people through street-based youth work. It has provided early help and support for young people and has developed a specific service for young carers, also improving the ways young people can access mental health support. It has also continued to champion young people’s rights and hear their voices.
I’m so proud of all the brilliant work the Young Hackney service has done over the past ten years for Hackney’s young people and the borough. As a service that puts young people at the heart of its focus, we have had a lot to celebrate and reflect on since we launched. Over the past two years especially with the pandemic we have strived to show great commitment in running this service to help our young residents develop their skills, ambitions and provide universal youth work opportunities. Our extensive school holiday programme delivers a varied programme of activities, events and opportunities, for all age groups and abilities.
Young Hackney celebrations will also continue throughout the autumn and winter months with events like the Youth Summit and the Annual Youth Awards which celebrates Young People from across the borough. The ten-year milestones will also be celebrated through 2022 and 2023.
For more information visit: https://www.younghackney.org
Programme of Events
- 24 July, Forest Road and the Edge Youth Hubs: Information open day with Young Hackney - merchandise available.
- 28 July, Outdoor Sports event at Hackney Downs from 11am-3pm with activities including mini-track cycling, multi-sports games, rowing and basketball drills.
- 29 July, Forest Road Youth Hub: Hackney School of food trip with the opportunity to make some healthy alternative party foods. There will also be team building water sports activities, and some preliminary practice events leading to the Young Hackney Olympic sporting event in August.
- 30 July, Hackney Marsh Adventure Playground - celebrating with a circus themed fun day with a circus skills workshop, stilt walking, plate spinning and juggling. Playground will be open from 10am-1pm and 2pm-5pm with workshops from 11am-1pm and 2pm-4pm. In between we will be offering other fun things such as face-painting, hook-a-duck, balance boards, hula hooping, strongman/woman competition, mask-making, alongside clowning about!
- 30 July, Shoreditch Adventure Playground: A carousel of activities running throughout the day from 10am-5pm, for children and young people aged 6-15 years.
- 30th July, Edge Youth Hub, A celebration BBQ
- 4 August, National Play Day: We will be celebrating play across our Hubs and award-winning Adventure Playgrounds. There will be play packs and lots of opportunities to play with friends and staff! There will also be a multi-sports festival taking place at Haggerston Park.
- 14 August, Annual Family Summer Picnic - eat outdoors, have a break, enjoy the sunshine (hopefully), and have fun with friends.
- 11 August, Summer Olympic fun day at Finsbury Park.
- 20 August, Summer Showcase, bringing young people past and present from across the borough to share and celebrate achievements of the last ten years. This event will include live entertainment, food, sports and lots of fun activities to get involved in.