Venue Address
Greensfield Business Centre
Mulgrave Terrace
Gateshead
NE8 1PU
United Kingdom
54.962956666792, -1.6070955388319
We are looking for volunteers to support people with learning disabilities/autistic people to learn to travel safely and independently. Volunteers would help our participants to:
- learn a particular route
- remember about staying safe when crossing roads
- be around people they don’t know
- help people to remember where to get on or off the bus or metro
- find the place they want to get to
- teach people how to cope if something goes wrong.
Volunteers would work closely with people until they are ready to start to travel on their own. Then they gradually reduce their support until the person is making the journey independently. Finally, we shadow the person to make sure that they can make the journey independently and safely.
We have taught people to travel to college, to work, to a daycentre, to town to meet with friends, even round the corner to the local shop. “I was supported to travel Gateshead College, then a new route to Newcastle College. I loved the travel training it has given me confidence to do more things on my own.”
Are you interested in volunteering?
"Being a volunteer is very rewarding and gives me a lot of job satisfaction. When you start training someone to travel who has never been on a bus before, you watch their confidence grow, then when another person shadows them and tells you how well they have done it is a great sense of personal achievement. It is a lovely feeling when you see the person you have supported out and about on their own."
We want to enable people to access public transport and meet and walk to new areas with a view to increasing independence to travel without support when confident. Our ideal volunteers will have a friendly and positive outlook and be good at talking and listening to people. What you will receive: you will get training and certificates relevant to your role e.g. disability awareness, travel training. You will meet other volunteers and get 1 to 1 support, endorsement on LinkedIn and references can also be provided. This is a very rewarding and fun role and a great way to build your own skills and confidence
If you are interested in finding out more or you think you know someone who would like some help to travel, please contact us.
Skills needed
Benefits for the Volunteer
Volunteering with us is a fantastic way to build your own skills and confidence in a friendly and supportive environment. Our team of volunteers helps us to reach more people who need our support. In return, our volunteers benefit from valuable and rewarding work experience, training and certificates relevant to their role and mentoring and support from our staff team. We can also provide references and endorsement on LinkedIn.
