The WW2 Dunkirk little ship, the Skylark IX’s story of hope and resilience is what inspires all of our Community Engagement activity, alongside the people we work with. Weekly, five adults in recovery and one retired community member participate in our boatbuilding programme based in the Denny Tank Museum, Dumbarton.  We also have 14 members of the community who engage weekly in our textile group based in the Lennox Evangelical Church. Over the past few years we have continued to engage with young people in schools and local community centres, as well as running our own youth sessions outside, locally, all around West Dunbartonshire.  Our regular Community Engagement activities helps to reduce social isolation, and creates opportunities for skills building in a meaningful, inclusive, therapeutic and collaborative way, developing our Skylark IX Crew Culture, which makes everyone involved feel a part of something for their collective or individual goals and aspirations.   We intend to have Skylark IX Rowing School Summer sessions running twice weekly for 6 weeks through July and August 2023, specifically targeting young people ranging from ages 12-25. These sessions will be based out at Balloch on Loch Lomond and the River Leven at our base by the Maid of the Loch. We will utilise funding to bring in support and expertise from partnering organisations such as Royal West Amateur Rowing Club, alongside our own team of trained volunteers from our current programmes/rowing school members and employ a sessional youth worker to support the logistics and operational support of the project engaging with the young people too.  We will purchase any necessary extra water safety equipment (i.e. life jackets) and buy materials for our boatbuilders to produce smaller oars. We will also utilise a bit of contingency for any other potential amendments to our wooden boats or adjustments that may need to be resolved in the workshop, to ensure our boats are fully accessible for any young person wishing to be participate. This will be a free activity for young people, where they will be supported with safe travel where required, to and from our sessions, and we will help tackle holiday hunger by providing ample amounts of healthy breakfasts, lunches, water and snacks for all involved.  We will also purchase Crew T-shirts and beanies to gift to the young people involved, to evoke further becoming part of "The Skylark IX Crew".

We are a Football Club with a youth Academy based in Alexandria, we have 252 playing members and 52 non playing members. The money will be used to help with the cost of facility hire and to relieve the financial burden in families due to the cost-of-living crisis. This will benefit Our members within our community.

We are a parent council of approximately 15 members supporting 350 pupils within the school. We do this by meeting regularly with school senior leaders to discuss school issues and ways the parent council can support the school.  We do regular fundraising that helps to supplement school funds, which are used to enhance the children’s educational experience.   Fundraising is done through events such as Christmas and spring fairs, bounce-a-thons, sponsored walks.  The money will be used to purchase Chromebooks for Knoxland Primary School. This will benefit all children, teaching and support staff within the school environment, giving them access to a wider range of resources and digitally enabled lessons.

Police Scotland Youth Volunteers are a voluntary organisation, led by Police Scotland and encourages our young people to achieve the best that they can be.  Each group can support up to 24 young people who are mentored by adult volunteers and our aim is to engage with the young people of West Dunbartonshire, release their spirit of adventure and support the local community through various initiatives.   During our evening sessions, our volunteers learn about First Aid, Water Safety, policing, partnership working and the various charities that support their local communities. This develops their skills and confidence and are then put to the test by assisting with voluntary hours at local organisations, events and fund raisers. We also encourage our volunteers into peer-education such as ‘No Knives Better Lives’ and ‘Keep Safe Scotland’.  Each young person can achieve Saltire Award certificates for their voluntary time and accredited qualifications and awards The money provided will allow for young people, from all backgrounds, to join without any restrictions or barriers, (financial or otherwise). Each volunteer must wear a uniform when attending at organised events and although every effort is being made to recycle uniform. Funding is required for the purchase of individual uniform items which both the youth and adult volunteers are required to wear. A full uniforms and suitable footwear for registered volunteers can cost in excess of £150.00 per person.

We are a foodbank serving West Dunbartonshire, our main office is based in Dumbarton. We provide support to children and families affected by poverty and food insecurity in West Dunbartonshire.  We will use this funding to continue to buy food stock for the foodbank and continue our community soup project.

Silverton Summerplay was a group set up over 25 years ago by a group of parents with children at Knoxland Primary, Braehead Primary and St Patrick’s Primary to give the children in p4-p7 a week of fun activities in the summer.  We are now a committee of 12 volunteer parents from the 3 primary schools who continue this on an annual basis.  We meet as a committee every 2 months to plan fundraising events and also the fun week.  Our fundraising consists of discos for over 100 children as well as an annual bag packing in a local supermarket.  These funds are then used to book a fun day at Knoxland and various days out visiting parks and amusement parks.  This funding will be used to cover the costs of the coaches we hire for the trips and also towards the park entrance for the children. All families who take part in the summerplay week will benefit.  The cost of the week has been £50 and any additional funding would help to keep the cost of the trip to this level with the cost of the buses increasing over the last few years.

At Mini Messy Monsters we provide messy and sensory place for all children as children with ASN could come and the parents could relax due to there being no “structure” to messy and sensory play so children were not seen as being “naught and disruptive” !. We hope in the near future to put on more days during the week also, the best thing about class is that we are accessible for all children and families in particular who have more than one child have somewhere they can take all their  children at the same time, classes are normally for the dreaded terms “asn children” or “mainstream children” and at our classes we do not believing in separating children and all children should play together! The problem is unfortunately there is not many places that are accessible for all children. Our numbers vary each session but we can take up to 40 children per session. The monies will be spent on buying accessible Messy and sensory equipment for all children, along with helping us to provide our new Makaton song and story class and accessible dance class for all children.

We are based in Centre81 in Clydebank, we run an art and sport club on a Friday night and Saturday morning this service is for children who have autism, siblings are also welcome. Parents have an area provided for parents who want to stay and chat through the sessionsWe will use the funding to expand the group to meet the demand as we are getting new referrals weekly. This will benefit Children and families affected by Autism.

Working in schools, colleges and other organisations we work alongside young people the Autistic Spectrum who may not fit the We aren’t school, we aren’t church, we are somewhere in between.  We can help individuals, parents and those who work and live around folk on the Spectrum and if we can’t help we will point people in the direction of those that can. We will use the funding for Developing and paying for our website so people can access help and ideas, travel, equipment and getting this activity of the ground properly. This will benefit Individuals and their parents, as well as organisations such as schools, Churches and all those working with folk on the Spectrum.  Examples of our work can be found on our website.

We are Gavinburn Primary School’s Parent Counci who meet on average once a month and our aim is to help promote partnership between the school, its pupils, its parents and the community. We develop and engage in activities throughout the year which support the school, education and welfare of the pupils.  We identify and represent the views of parents on not only the education provided by the school but any matters affecting the school, education and welfare of the pupils. We strive to increase social and well-being opportunities for our pupils and community.  We would like to fund the purchase of outdoor wear for pupils of Gavinburn Primary School.  We will purchase  waterproof jackets and trousers, fleece jackets and wellington boots to allow more outdoor learning for the pupils.  Gavinburn encourages as much outdoor learning as possible and considers itself to be an "outdoor" school.  Our pupils will benefit from this funding.