VOLUNTEERING Matters has launched Learn Together Cymru to help support children and young people across Wales.

This ambitious Big Lottery funded project aims to recruit and train a national network of volunteers to support the basic skills of youngsters, with the help of strategic partner organisations such as Save the Children, Book Trust Cymru and Communities First.

The project builds on Volunteering Matters’ 50+ years of experience of supporting learning and the 500 Volunteering Matters’ reading volunteers already in place in Welsh primary schools.

It responds to demand from schools for support in other subject areas, as well as from secondary schools, after school clubs and professionals in community and family learning, especially in areas where basic skills levels are poor.

Learn Together Cymru will target older volunteers – aged 50 plus years – through the organisation’s RSVP (Retired and Senior Volunteer) Programme, although it is expected that some proportion of the volunteers will be younger people seeking work-related experience from their placements.

All prospective volunteers will undergo reference and criminal records checks before they are placed or signposted on to other projects.

Partners in the project will help to target areas and groups needing support, and provide resources and spaces for learning activities, as well as expertise and training in areas such as literacy learning, numeracy and child safeguarding.

More information about Volunteering Matters and their work in Wales is at volunteeringmatters.org.uk.