Member Profile: SOLVE IT
09 June, 2011
SOLVE IT provides a unique holistic and specialist service tackling all issues in relation to Volatile Substance Abuse.
Background
SOLVE IT was established in 1989 following the death of the Chief Executives, Barbara Skinners son Darren, in 1988, due to Volatile Substance Abuse (VSA) and since then, it has continually provided VSA education, training, and awareness for parents, professionals, the community and most importantly children and young people.
As a responsible parent, (and qualified nurse) Barbara had informed her children about the dangers of smoking, alcohol, and illegal drugs, yet before her son's death her knowledge of VSA was non‑existent, this type of substance abuse was not discussed. A few months on from her son’s death she began to think about the general lack of awareness on this subject and in 1989 Barbara began taking positive steps to learn and then inform children, young people, parents and professionals to the consequences of VSA.
SOLVE IT was born and prevention through education was its main objective. By promoting a greater awareness to the types of products abused and emphasising the dangers of such abuse, free of charge, to children, young people, parents, professionals and the community in general, she hoped to make a difference.
SOLVE IT has progressively developed its service provision, increasing its contacts and widening its geographical growth yearly whilst providing a free service to children, young people, parents, carers and those affected by such abuse. It promotes a general awareness to the consequences of this type of substance abuse and works towards the prevention of related deaths, illness, accidents, crime, and social exclusion. In addition, it provides out-reach for those who do not access main stream school, a counselling, family support, signposting and referral service for those affected by such abuse both locally and nationally, and training for professionals.
Requests for information, universal and targeted education, training, counselling and family support continue to increase and contacts are growing rapidly each year. There remains no other similar charity that encompasses all of the services currently provided by SOLVE IT in relation to VSA.
The Service Provides
VSA awareness, preventative education, early intervention, rapid response for VSA hotspots support and counselling for children and young people aged 9 and upwards. This information will be especially tailored to ensure that individuals receive not just a basic knowledge of VSA but life skill strategies that are calibrated appropriately to the understanding of the topic, overall exposure to VSA and likelihood of experimentation.
VSA awareness, increased knowledge and support for parents and carers which will enable them to help their children and young people make informed health decisions, enable a dialogue and increase potential for early identification and interventions. Family support and counselling for parents and carers will also be provided for those whose children and young people may be affected by VSA.
VSA Awareness Events for parents, their community and community groups will ensure that they are equipped with essential knowledge that will empower them in prevention, through early dialogue with their children and early detection, whilst enabling support routes to our specialist service provision be identified.
The dissemination of information and awareness at the community events will help to create empathy to the consequences of VSA, dispel myths and stigma of this type of substance abuse.
In addition the events may alleviate community fears in relation to crime and enable those in the communities who choose to, to support abusers and their families in their achieving their goals.
It could also lead to stronger links between children and young people, their families and communities.
Increased knowledge and awareness of VSA for professionals working with children and young people through training will ensure they have the skills to enable them to address the issues surrounding VSA and provide a pathway to specialist support and referral. In addition, they will be enabled to respond to early identification, intervention and referral to the Family Support Counsellor.
Achievements
- In 2003, SOLVE IT received The Queens Award for Voluntary Service
- In 2004, SOLVE IT won the Barclaycard/Northants 96 “Making a Difference Award”
- In October 2004 SOLVE IT hosted its 1st of 4 annual National Conferences on Volatile Substance Abuse.
- In February 2007 the Charity was one of ten national winners of The GlaxoSmithKline-King’s Fund IMPACT Award.
- In July 2007 SOLVE IT led the first ever VSA Conference for Young People – “Action for Youth”
- In January 2008 SOLVE IT was one of 90 national winners of the Royal Bank of Scotland/Daily Mail Making an Impact Award
- In July 2008 Barbara Skinner MBE was awarded the Institute of Trading Standards Hero Award
Perhaps, most importantly, to date SOLVE IThas provided input to over 270,000 children, young people, parents, carers, professionals and organisations.
What’s next for the organisation?
In recent months SOLVE IT have been actively working within the education system and engaging with young people undertaking Diploma Courses at Ferrers Specialist Arts College, Northamptonshire and using their skills and resources to develop two educational DVDs for training material for use by SOLVE IT. In addition current partnership work with Leverton Secure Unit in Essex has also produced training material entitled ‘Tooting Hill, more like Tooting Hell!’ developed by young people and aimed at their peer groups.
How has being a Youth Access member helped?
“Membership to Youth Access is of great importance to us. Being a national registered charity it is important that we are able to access up to date information on funding, policy updates, training etc and Youth Access to do an excellent job of this, as well as providing an ‘umbrella’ of advice, information and support available to young people. We are proud to be a member of the largest provider of advice and counselling services in the UK.”
