NI Rare Disease Partnership

The Northern Ireland Rare Disease Partnership (NIRDP) are thrilled to introduce their newly devised education and upskilling programme, “Understanding Rare”. This initiative is designed to foster a deeper understanding and empathy towards the unique needs of the 1 in 17/110K individuals (many of which are children) living with rare diseases or conditions in Northern Ireland, and many of whom experience acute mental health/financial/work/housing or isolation needs alongside carers or family members who are also experiencing these challenges. Some of these “Rare Stories” can be found here

NIRDP understand that mental health providers and Helplines NI (of which we are also a member) play a pivotal role in offering support and guidance to these individuals. Therefore, we have crafted a free 1.5-hour remote learning Continuing Professional Development (CPD) session that aims to equip mental health or helpline and support staff with the necessary knowledge and skills to address their needs more effectively.

Through this short programme, participants will be better prepared to:

  • Understand the complex needs of those with rare diseases in our community.
  • Empathise with their unique challenges and experiences through the sharing of Rare Stories
  • Signpost more successfully to organisations like the NIRDP or other rare condition organisations, facilitating a network of comprehensive support.

NIRDP are pleased to inform you that this initiative is generously funded by the Community Foundation/DOH in Northern Ireland, a testament to the significance and potential impact of this programme. We kindly then encourage you to share this invaluable opportunity with your staff, colleagues, and those in your organisation responsible for supporting CPD initiatives. For further information or to express your interest, please do not hesitate to contact us directly or share this email with colleagues within or beyond your own organisation that may find this matter of interest, especially in training or HR departments.

 

 

Issue 118 – Southern Area FYI – 25th January 2024

Welcome to Issue 118 of our fortnightly newsletter, ‘FYI’ (For Your Information).

Download Issue 118

(Note: Newsletter will download directly to your device.  Look out for the pop-up box and click on open file when it appears)

As you may already be aware, Children’s Mental Health Week 2024 is taking place from 5th to 11th February and Safer Internet Day 2024 is on Tuesday 6th February. With these important campaigns in mind, we are calling for submissions (as well as the usual information) which are relevant in these areas for the next edition of ‘FYI’. These can be resources, information, support services events and links and will be included in our special edition, with a focus on children’s mental health and safer internet use, coming out on Thursday 8th February.

Looking forward to your submissions!

 Locality Development Team (Southern Trust Area)

CCP Regional Conference: Caring for yourself and others – Nurturing connections for wellness

Working with young children is acknowledged as being challenging both physically and psychologically. Even so, Early Years Educators demonstrate very high commitment to the children in their care. However, you cannot pour from an empty cup, and in this Keynote Mary explains the impact of stress on our lives, and looks at how Educators can support their own wellbeing and avoid burnout. Participants will also have the opportunity to attend 2 of 3 workshops, details of all workshops are on page 2.

Download Conference Flyer 

Conference details: 
Date: Thursday 29th February 2024
Time: Registration from 9am, the conference will take place 9.30am – 3pm
Venue: Tullyglass Hotel, Ballymena

 

Issue 117 – Southern Area FYI – 11 January 2024

Welcome to Issue 117 of our fortnightly newsletter, ‘FYI’ (For Your Information), our first edition of ‘FYI’ of 2024.

Download Issue 117

(Note: Newsletter will download directly to your device.  Look out for the pop-up box and click on open file when it appears)

The vast array of information included reflects the fantastic work that continues across the Southern Trust Area and we are always happy to include all relevant submission (See criteria for submissions on Page 71).

 For those who attend our locality Planning Groups, we have listened to preferences given by members and will continue to alternate all our meetings between Zoom and face-to-face. For those who do not attend, see the flyer on Page 4 to find out more about how our meetings work and how to get involved. Just contact us, if you have any queries.

Locality Development Team (Southern Trust Area)

School Uniform Recycling Toolkit 2023

 

Download Infographic Report

The Southern Area Locality Planning Team have produced an Infographic to report on the impact of this year’s School Uniform Recycling Toolkit. This free resource was produced to provide a user friendly, free, practical guide for schools and community groups to use in order to hold a successful school uniform recycling scheme. We provided checklists for discussions, templates to use, tips which shared good practice, and evaluation forms which we collated to produce individual reports for each initiative.

11 schools and groups used the Toolkit during 2023 and send completed feedback forms to demonstrate the effectiveness of the resource.

We had around 1,250 items donated totalling a value of over £8,000. These items were successfully recycled across the Southern area.

If your school or group is interested in finding out more about this free resource, and how to avail of our support in 2024, please contact Darren  Curtis at localityplanning@ci-ni.org.uk