I am so chuffed to be part of charity that makes a real difference in young people’s lives. My role requires me to attend lots of meetings, preparing papers for the Board and Committees, and trying to raise funds. To be honest, it can sometimes be quite tedious and I wonder whether all this talking is really achieving anything. But then I meet one of the young people we have supported and suddenly it’s all worthwhile.

Just recently we celebrated 7 young people completing a 12 week Prince’s Trust Team. I love these events because we all dress up quite posh, including the young ‘graduates’ and they tell us in their own imaginative way what they got up to. It’s not long before you realise they are a group of interesting characters. A guy with Asperger’s Syndrome, a lass had become quite heavily involved in drugs, another who kept getting in trouble with the police, another with a learning disability and so on. All very different and yet somehow they not only managed to stick together in a very intensive programme, but had grown to really value each other’s strong points and, more importantly, tolerate their weaknesses!

I particularly loved the story of Laura (not her real name) who had to appear in court half way through the course for something she had done before she started the programme. We advocated for her, asking the magistrate to allow her to finish the course, which he did. But before she left she managed to get 30 quid out of the magistrate and the prosecutor towards their community project. You have to be sharp to live in their world – turn it to good and you’ve got something really special.

Thanks to these sorts of young people and many, many more who Guildford YMCA support, I will endure meetings and papers, and will unashamedly plead for money to do more!

PB 13Jun08