This Saturday is World Mental Health Day 2020 and with mental health at the very forefront of our community ventures, Rob Morris has kindly given us some more details on some of those initiatives that Hendon Football Club support through our community outreach work through Silver Jubilee Park.

You'll remember that we announced Cricklewood-based Ashford Place as our community sponsor this year. Ashford Place have not paid any money to the club for us to display their logo on our Social Media image cards this season, Hendon Football Club along with Silver Jubilee Park decided to showcase Ashford Place and support their many outstanding initiatives that help the most vulnerable within our local community.

One such initiative is Brent Thrive.

This exciting new venture is born out of the feedback from the people using the mental health services at Ashford Place. During Lockdown we have been working hard to keep people feeling connected and continue working with people online and on the phone. Now more than ever people with lived experience of mental health difficulties living in Brent are looking to community action to change things. Brent Thrive is a mental health community action grass-roots project committed to change.

The aims of the project are:

Challenging the stigma around Mental Health

Amplifying minority voices and providing a platform for community leaders to enact change

Creating infrastructure of services and groups that are led by people with lived experience from within Brent

Identifying and providing support for people with a lived experience to take up political roles

Promote greater awareness and understanding of mental health across Brent

Creating a welcoming and accessible community

Use of practices that help diverse groups work well towards complex and challenging outcomes and understand that we all need support to grow and develop

For more details on Brent Thrive, please visit the Brent Thrive page on Ashford Place's homepage. We at Hendon Football Club are delighted to support such a vital project which is aimed at tackling the continuing stigma around mental health and that provides such valuable support in the local community to those most in need.