The shortlist is divided into five categories of adult learning initiatives that support people with:
The STAR Awards is judged by an independent panel of educators, policymakers, adult learners, and other adult learning experts.
This category, which is sponsored by Mental Health Ireland, is open to adult learning initiatives that support increased health and wellbeing for participants, including mental and physical health, recovery from addiction, nutrition, and sports.
The Community Food Club is a pilot initiative taking place in Ballymun Child and Family Resource Centre, which provides people and families with access to good-quality nutritious food for a small cost. The clubs targets people who face food poverty in the local area. Participants range from young parents to pensioners, who are facing challenges in relation to food poverty and the cost-of-living crisis. As part of the club, people have the choice of up to 12 food items from a vast variety of products. This means people have autonomy over their food. There is also an education side to the club, offering a wrap-around service that teaches participants important food skills, and offers advice on finance and wellbeing services in the local community. The club alleviates food insecurity, providing a reliable source of nutritious food for individuals and families. It tackles issues with nutrition and health inequalities, offering a variety of healthy food options, including fresh produce and wholegrains and addressing the physical and nutritional health needs of individuals and families in the community. It also helps reduce food waste, working with FoodCloud and local producers and retailers so as not to waste surplus food. By redistributing this food to those in need, they play a crucial role in reducing food waste and promoting sustainability. The club fosters community engagement and support, creating a space where people can come together, volunteer, and support one another.
The Maternal Advocacy and Support (MAS) project provides maternal mental health peer support across women's centres in Belfast. Women attend a peer support group led by a facilitator, and engage in conversation in groups, as well as workshops on health and wellbeing. We provide lunch and childcare on site, and women can access other support services and adult learning courses. The project has been running for just over 3 years. MAS is also a campaigning and advocacy group, where women share their lived experience with the aim of improving services in the future. Women have participated in lobbying and campaigning, spoken at events, participated in podcasts, created a flyer for healthcare professionals and a book of Women's Lived Experience. The women involved also have the opportunity to train as group leaders and in Mental Health, First Aid, Child Protection, and Facilitator Training. The women involved have told us that this has contributed to their healing and improved their wellbeing, as well as educating practitioners, the health service, the Department of Health and the general public, and breaking the stigma around maternal mental health.
The Social Therapeutic Horticulture Programme provides a therapy through horticulture in Clonmel, Co. Tipperary. Service users are in active addiction and are not working or engaging in any other training. The service has been funded for the last 3 years by Tipperary ETB to the Substance Misuse Service, HSE South Tipperary. The programme runs at the same time as methadone clinics, three afternoons a week. It is facilitated by a training Social Therapeutic Horticulturist, a key worker, and a counsellor assigned by the Substance Misuse Service. Service users work in the greenhouses and each has an individual care plan. They receive a hot lunch each day they attend and participate in activities. To date, one service user has completed a Level 5 course in Health care and is now working full-time. One Service user is working working full-time in horticulture. Others are currently attending courses in the ETB. We plant 400 daffodils each year and the service users donate the daffodils to the Irish Cancer Society. We plant a new plant for each service users who passes away. The service users wrote to the President of Ireland and asked if he would come and see their programme. He did, and they also spoke with him at Bloom in Dublin. The garden received local and national media interest and was featured on Country Wide on RTE 1.
This initiative is part of the “Family Learning Programme” in Kilkenny, and brought together people from over 27 different nationalities. This included parents, grandparents, and carers, from places as wide-ranging as South Sudan, Portugal, England, South Africa, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Romania, Czech Republic, Poland, and Lithuania. The project also included Irish people including Irish Travellers. The participants swapped cooking recipes and got involved in cooking demonstrations, resulting in the development of strong relationships between people from different cultures. It encouraged people to get out and about in the community through library visits and other local outings. The project resulted in increased positive mental health for participants, and a stronger sense of belonging and connection for people from different backgrounds and cultures. It recently featured on Kilkenny Carlow radio station KCLR96FM.
This peer support group helps individuals with any kind of addictive behaviour. It uses self-empowering skills to help participants work towards a balanced life, to manage thoughts, feelings, and behaviours, to cope with urges and build and maintain their motivation. SMART Recovery views addictive behaviour as each person’s responsibility. The aim is for people to be part of a supportive environment, and surrounded by others sharing similar experiences, which will hopefully lessen feelings of isolation and instil a sense of hope. Over the past year, Start360 has delivered this programme to 93 groups in prisons, and the community group has supported 37 people over the past year and is open on a drop-in basis The initiative has resulted in improved health and wellbeing for participants due to the abstinence from, or reduction in, substance use or addictive behaviour. As a result of stopping or reducing substance use participants have reduced their likelihood of reoffending. SMART empowers participants to take responsibility for their actions and offers the choice to change.
LCC Community Trust in Co. Antrim recognises that financial hardship affects people in many ways, like poorer health outcomes, a lack of social opportunities, and prolonged stress which can lead to early aging and compromised immune systems. Their focus on wellbeing seeks to inspire hope for participants and break the intergenerational cycle of poverty. From their Kickstart Social Supermarket programme, to their Community Wellbeing Advocate and Wellbeing Ambassador, to their Wellness Recovery Action Planning (WRAP) programme, they have been supporting people with their physical and mental health for years. They run short courses like “Goal Setting” and “Eat Well, Be Well”, as well as weekly walking and peer support groups, and regular 1-2-1 sessions, and they recently piloted a fitness programme. Last year, 26 people completed their WRAP programme, with 77% of participants showing a positive increase in their mental wellbeing.
Because the STAR Awards ceremony is focussed on the nominees, particularly the learners, it is an invite-only event. But we'll be sharing the ceremony as it happens on our social media, and spotlighting the winners.
The Adult Learners’ Festival, happening this year from 4th to 8th March 2024, is a nationwide celebration of adult learning. This year’s theme is “Everyday Learning Spaces – Find Yourself Here,” celebrating safe and supportive learning environments, wherever they may be.
Visit this page for more details about the Festival
Find us on aontas.com or on X/Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIN for the latest updates #ALF24 #FindYourselfHere
For more information, contact alf@aontas.com
