Established over a year ago and held at Crawley Rugby Football Club, the group meets every 2 months and enjoys a variety of social activities in the Club House: games, snooker, music events and meeting animals on special visits.
The group was set up by Mark Rodwell, who as a parent of a young adult with learning disabilities discovered that the nearest social group for his son was in Worthing. Disappointed but not deterred, Mark and his wife decided to set up a social club in Crawley. Mark’s links with Crawley Rugby Football Club provided a perfect venue.
The venue also had links with other adults with learning disabilities through WorkAid. WorkAid is part of the Aldingbourne Trust – a West Sussex Charity that supports adults with learning disabilities. The role of WorkAid is to support adults with learning disabilities to find paid and voluntary work in the county. Consequently, four WorkAid clients and one volunteer work at Crawley RFC setting up the pitch for games, packing away equipment after games and scoring in games. One of the club members, Wayne, has been working at the Club for over a year, setting up the pitches for games, and now he enjoys being part of the social club too.
Mark has been very pleased with the Social Club’s success: “it has provided a place and opportunity for young adults with learning disabilities to meet up and socialise. This interaction with other people, including people who use Crawley RFC, has greatly increased their confidence. We have two sisters who were very shy and hardly spoke to anyone when they first came to the club. Now they are very much part of the group and one sister has even got a job in Horsham County Hall that involves talking to the public – an indication of how much her confidence has increased. From a different perspective, meeting our Social Club members has also increased the awareness about learning disabilities amongst members of the public.
The link with WorkAid has been great, my son Sam has got jobs through their support at the YMCA shop, as an WSCC event assistant, scoring at the Crawley RFC and on the Aldingbourne Trust’s Adopt a Station scheme where he assists with planting and watering at West Sussex train stations.”
New members to the Social Club are very welcome, they will need to be over 18; for more details contact Mark Rodwell: 07970 935227 rodwellmark@talk21.com
For more information about WorkAid and the Aldingbourne Trust please visit their website: www.aldingbournetrust.co.uk