Kissing it Better

Last year, the Pargiter Trust funded our idea to get older people performing comedy drama. The programme has been a huge success, bringing confidence, laughter and new friends to residents of three care settings in the Leeds area.

How’s your volunteering going? Have you made new friends? Learned new skills? We want to hear your story, and so do other young people thinking of starting their volunteering journey.

Kissing it Better’s unique scheme lets you gain valuable volunteering experience – perfect for your Duke of Edinburgh’s Award & UCAS statement. Taking part in our programme will also boost your CV and enhance your understanding of the challenges of healthcare, especially linked to the care of older people.

Over the summer, our young volunteers helped us deliver good old-fashioned fun to local care homes, with a bumper range of traditional British fetes.

Since the start of the pandemic, we’ve been running Zoom comedy drama groups for older people. What started as a simple idea to lift lockdown loneliness has turned into an ongoing programme that gives older people the chance to learn new skills and meet new friends … all from the comfort of their own home.

Kissing it Better’s unique scheme lets you gain valuable volunteering experience remotely – and when rules allow, face-to-face – perfect for your Duke of Edinburgh’s Award & UCAS statement. Taking part in our programme will also boost your CV and enhance your understanding of the challenges of healthcare, especially linked to the care of older people.

Children’s art can make you marvel, make you laugh and make your day. Now that joy is lighting up a ward at Warwick Hospital, thanks to local schoolchildren.

Happy New Year, Kibbers! Before we launch headlong into the new one, let’s take a moment to look back at just some of the highlights of 2021. In no particular order, here are some of the things that made us smile last year.

Since the very first lockdown, we’ve been working hard to make sure that our students could still make a difference to the lives of isolated older people. It’s been a huge challenge, but we’ve learned a lot. Now we’ve made a short film looking back at what we did and how we did it. Thanks to the thousands of young people who who joined in – this film is dedicated to you.

In Yorkshire, we’re running a unique creative project, funded by the Coronavirus Community Support Fund, distributed by the National Lottery. The scheme is bringing music, drama, companionship and joy to older people across the region.