A SMALL charity in York has won international recognition for its mentoring work with vulnerable children and young people.

The Island has become the first charity in the North of England to win the European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC) Mentoring Award.

Based in Priory Street, The Island helps to transform lives by developing the confidence, self-esteem and resilience levels.

Children who use its mentoring services include those who are witnessing and/or experiencing domestic violence, showing early signs of mental ill-health, in foster care due to no fault of their own, struggling with emotional and social wellbeing and for other reasons.

It is one of York's few early intervention services, providing a lifeline for those who need support.

The Island currently has 166 children and young people registered, of whom 56 have one-to-one mentoring, while 91 attend groups and 19 are awaiting a volunteer mentor but are not engaged in any of the groups.

The mentoring includes one-to-one sessions and programmes in schools and groups, which all have high success rates.

Nigel Poulton, CEO, said: “We knew our mentoring schemes were unique, however to receive international recognition of all our volunteers, staff team and trustees hard work was such a great surprise. I am delighted the charity has received such a prestigious award for the work we do to help the next generation.”

He hopes the award will highlight the importance of early intervention support to help youngsters to realise their potential and go on to lead healthier and happier lives.

“The affirmation of this award is both an honour and a great privilege. It also gives us great encouragement to continue pushing forward for positive change for a better future for our current, past and future mentees.”

He said they now hoped to recruit more mentors and add more STEM elements to group-based mentoring programmes to promote opportunities in science, technology, engineering and maths industries.

"Our current statistics show that our mentees get more positive thoughts and feelings during the mentoring process and we want to ensure that opportunities they felt were unattainable before mentoring become attainable for them during and after mentoring.”

Dr Riza Kadilar, EMCC President, said: “EMCC is committed to contributing to the development of an inclusive society fit for a digital age and able to cope with climate challenge. I’m pleased to see that the winners of 2019 EMCC mentoring awards at both individual and institutional levels are a living tribute that mentoring has a crucial role to play in that regard. I should also extend my special thanks to our distinguished jury members for their diligent work in selecting such high calibre winners.”

Nigel will receive the award on behalf of The Island at EMCC’s conference in Paris in June.

Only four organisations from across Europe were recognised for their high-quality mentoring work.

According to reports published by the Two Riding Community Foundation, there are about 3,570 children living in poverty in York despite their parents or carers being in work.