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Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People

In Northern Ireland, nearly 30% of children are thought to be at risk of going hungry in the summer holidays when they are unable to access free school meals. Community groups, voluntary groups, local authorities, and faith groups have responded to this concern by developing and delivering holiday p...

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Autores principales: Shinwell, Jackie, Finlay, Ellen, Allen, Caitlin, Defeyter, Margaret Anne
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7908485/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33540871
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18031337
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author Shinwell, Jackie
Finlay, Ellen
Allen, Caitlin
Defeyter, Margaret Anne
author_facet Shinwell, Jackie
Finlay, Ellen
Allen, Caitlin
Defeyter, Margaret Anne
author_sort Shinwell, Jackie
collection PubMed
description In Northern Ireland, nearly 30% of children are thought to be at risk of going hungry in the summer holidays when they are unable to access free school meals. Community groups, voluntary groups, local authorities, and faith groups have responded to this concern by developing and delivering holiday programmes that enable children from low-income families to take part in activities and access food. The current study used purposive sampling to investigate children’s and young people’s views of holiday provision, from across three holiday clubs, in Northern Ireland. Both primary school children (n = 34; aged 4–11) and secondary school children (n = 31; aged 12–17) showed high levels of awareness of poverty and food insecurity and associated pressures and stresses on households. Importantly, children and young people did not feel stigmatised about attending holiday provision, suggesting a positive and inclusive culture towards holiday club attendance. Children reported that they enjoyed the range of activities provided at holiday clubs and reported that attendance improved their self-confidence, especially for some older children, who acted as peer mentors to younger attendees, helped them to develop new skills, and provided them with opportunities to socialise with peers in a safe environment, out with their normal social groupings in school. Older children showed a high level of shrewdness and knowledge of sectarian divides in communities but spoke positively about how different religious or cultural backgrounds did not matter in terms of meeting and making new friends in holiday club settings. In terms of food provision, the findings of this study suggest that further work needs to be done to support children to access and eat healthy, nutritious food.
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spelling pubmed-79084852021-02-27 Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People Shinwell, Jackie Finlay, Ellen Allen, Caitlin Defeyter, Margaret Anne Int J Environ Res Public Health Article In Northern Ireland, nearly 30% of children are thought to be at risk of going hungry in the summer holidays when they are unable to access free school meals. Community groups, voluntary groups, local authorities, and faith groups have responded to this concern by developing and delivering holiday programmes that enable children from low-income families to take part in activities and access food. The current study used purposive sampling to investigate children’s and young people’s views of holiday provision, from across three holiday clubs, in Northern Ireland. Both primary school children (n = 34; aged 4–11) and secondary school children (n = 31; aged 12–17) showed high levels of awareness of poverty and food insecurity and associated pressures and stresses on households. Importantly, children and young people did not feel stigmatised about attending holiday provision, suggesting a positive and inclusive culture towards holiday club attendance. Children reported that they enjoyed the range of activities provided at holiday clubs and reported that attendance improved their self-confidence, especially for some older children, who acted as peer mentors to younger attendees, helped them to develop new skills, and provided them with opportunities to socialise with peers in a safe environment, out with their normal social groupings in school. Older children showed a high level of shrewdness and knowledge of sectarian divides in communities but spoke positively about how different religious or cultural backgrounds did not matter in terms of meeting and making new friends in holiday club settings. In terms of food provision, the findings of this study suggest that further work needs to be done to support children to access and eat healthy, nutritious food. MDPI 2021-02-02 2021-02 /pmc/articles/PMC7908485/ /pubmed/33540871 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18031337 Text en © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Shinwell, Jackie
Finlay, Ellen
Allen, Caitlin
Defeyter, Margaret Anne
Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People
title Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People
title_full Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People
title_fullStr Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People
title_full_unstemmed Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People
title_short Holiday Club Programmes in Northern Ireland: The Voices of Children and Young People
title_sort holiday club programmes in northern ireland: the voices of children and young people
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7908485/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33540871
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph18031337
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