FriendZ Volunteer Want to make a difference? Do something fun and inspirational with a serious impact? Become a FriendZ Meetups Volunteer! Social isolation and loneliness have a major impact on the health, well-being and life expectancy of adults with Down’s Syndrome. Down’s Syndrome Scotland’s exciting new FriendZ Meetups programme aims to tackle the loneliness and social isolation experienced by adults with Down’s syndrome in Scotland. By becoming a FriendZ Meetups volunteer you can help young people and adults with Down’s syndrome get out and about more, meet up with each other and grow their friendships as well as their confidence, self-esteem and independence skills. On top of that, it's also fun, rewarding and will make a serious impact on the people experiencing social isolation in Scotland!! FriendZ volunteers will form part of a team of trained, skilled, volunteers who will support small groups of adults with Down’s syndrome to come together for monthly social, community Meetups designed to promote the development of friendships, social skills, community confidence and independent decision making. Volunteers will also support the group members in identifying activities, groups and places of interest in their local community that they can access independently. The Role: To support young people and adults with Down’s syndrome to participate in social activities in small groups within their local areas to develop and sustain friendships with their peers through engaging in fun group activities together and gain community confidence. What the role involves: - Person centred support to young people and adults with Down’s syndrome in a social group situation. - Enable adults with Down’s syndrome to develop their friendships with each other by helping to make meeting arrangements, supporting independent travel and planning the social activities they choose to do. - To provide discrete individual/group support and promote a positive group dynamic, encouraging participation, responsibility taking and positively acknowledging skills and qualities of group members. - To ensure group safety and wellbeing through dynamic risk assessment and adaptive decision making. - Communicate positively with participants, parents and carers. - To establish and maintain appropriate boundaries within the volunteering relationship. - To support members to think about what’s on in their local areas and encourage positive lifestyle choices. - To participate in support, individual and peer supervision meetings and training events. Activities will take place monthly in the Glasgow area during weekdays evenings and during the day at weekends. The program will offer a range of social activities lasting 1-5 hours (3 hours on average) Interviews and training will take place online. If you are interested please click the ‘apply’ button below (available when logged in and registered). You will then be contacted by the coordinator by email. If you have not heard back after 5 working days, the first step is to contact the organisation with the contact details provided. You could also check your junk/spam folder on your emails just in case the response is there. If that doesn’t work out then please feel free to contact Volunteer Glasgow at 0141 226 3431