Please vote now for our entry “Sports Gear for Social Change” in the Aviva Community Fund. Voting closes 30 May! You can use all 10 votes to support our project. This funding would enable 60 refugees to attend health and well-being sessions and receive basic sports gear to start using their local sports facilities.
Sharing and increasing health knowledge
The Peer Education programme by Scottish Refugee Council and Greater Glasgow and Clyde was created to share and increase the knowledge of the NHS and other health services in the asylum seeker and refugee community, which is vital and allows refugees to establish a healthy life in Scotland.
Moving to a new country with a different culture, language and many times far away from your family and friends is not easy. I think it is fair to say coming to Scotland as an asylum seeker can be draining process both mentally and physically.
One of the biggest problems faced by the asylum seeker and refugee community in Scotland is the challenge to integrate into Scottish society. As a result of this there is a significant under-use of services on their part because people simply do not know what is available to them. I believe this is a contributing factor to the huge inequalities faced by the ethnic minority community in Scotland.
As Peer Educators, we are able to understand from our own experience, what the common health issues for asylum seekers and refugees are. But most importantly, through holding health and well-being sessions for refugees, we are establishing a relationship and empowering our communities by engaging with community members and recognising their capacities, knowledge, skills and life experiences.
Help us make our project more accessible
Empowerment is not only achieved through sharing knowledge. The core of our Project is creating a health and well-being Action Plan by refugees for refugees at the end of our sessions. This results in an activity, such as football, swimming or cooking that the group can all enjoy together which helps people mentally and physically and helps them integrate into society.
But we have faced real problems. Asylum seekers who are expected to live on as little as £5 a day simply cannot pay over three quarters of that to pay travel to come to our session and that is understandable. Which means a huge number of asylum seekers and refugees who are already struggling in integrating into our society will fall further through the cracks. Also when people don’t have trainers or swimming suits it’s pointless and it stands as a big barrier to them taking part in sports.
If we are able to have enough funding to provide our peers with travel expenses to sessions and basic sport equipment then this would drastically increase the numbers of people we can help through the project and their access to healthy activities.
This not only helps them physically but it also allows for them to have an hour free of the stress of making an asylum application or other anxiety due to getting refugee status and engaging with a brand new system.
I have seen first-hand how a simple activity like football can create such a difference to the well-being of a person, but I have also seen many people unable to come to that football session because they couldn’t afford the bus ticket or they didn’t have the correct footwear. We need to change this. We need to make our project more accessible and we need your help!
Please vote -and ask family and friends to vote- for our entry “Sports Gear for Social Change” in the Aviva Community Fund. You get 10 votes- if you like, you can use them all on this project to support refugees in Glasgow access Scottish Refugee Council’s Peer Education Health and Well-being project.
For more information on Scottish Refugee Council’s Peer Education project contact Elodie Mignard or Aso Fotoohi 0141 223 7968 or by email.
If you are interested to further support our work please contact Kirsty White on 0141 223 7921 or by email.
