Summer 2015 Newsletter - Round up

         
Big thank you to LUSH Cosmetics and the 7 stores which backed the Maya Centre with their Charity Pot on Saturday 13th June. The managers at each store were great and it was so kind of them to allow us to use the 'Soap Box Space' in their flagship store in Oxford Street to give Leyla Hussein a platform from which to highlight the key issues around FGM.  







Thank you to LUSH customers and our supporters for purchasing our charity pot, which helped to raise £1,119. This will add to the great work being done in the Dahlia Project, which is dedicated to women who have undergone Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).

 

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We are delighted to have been selected by our local Sainsbury's to be their 'Charity of the Year'. Alongside a written application, we were shortlisted with a local school and Bliss (NetMums partner). Shoppers voted in store via a ballot box and we received the majority vote! We will receive a year of fundraising and support from Sainsbury's Local 643-645 Holloway Road.
We’re very proud Sainsbury’s has recognised our vital counselling work in the community and we are now planning fundraising activities with our new supporters!
 

Legacy Fundraing
Tragedy happens to all of us and it's particularly hard to think about other causes when you have lost someone close to you. For that reason, Maya is reaching out gently to all of its supporters, to ask if you know someone who might be interested in supporting us after they have gone. This kind of memorial can do so much good for the women who come to us, helping them to live a more confident and fulfilled life. 
Please visit our website for information on legacy giving.

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Projects and workshops

 

Psychoeducation Workshop

The Psychoeducation workshop is now in its 3rd round and continues to grow in content and popularity.
The  workshop is made up of 8 weekly  group sessions. September’s workshop was attended by nine women. The teaching combines mind-body learning and processing, and covers weekly themes such as the Unconscious, Trauma and Assertiveness. 

 

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My Voice Project

The My Voice Project is a series of five storytelling workshops. The project will be run in partnership with, Jude Habib, from Sound Delivery, a specialist digital media consultancy with a passion for digital storytelling.

Starting on the 21^st October 2015, each workshop will be attended by 8 women, all of whom will have been supported by the Maya Centre. The participants will be supported to use sound recordings and the written word to interview each other, tell their own stories, and create a record of what they have shared.

The project aims to provide a truly empowering experience and help participants find their voice, whilst providing a sense of community spirit, to help these – often marginalized – women to escape their social isolation. At the end of the project, the stories will be pulled together into a script and turned into a sound recording, with the testimonies being voiced by an actress to protect confidentiality. There will also be a performance of the script, with the style of play and content to be confirmed.

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Complementary Therapies Pilot 















 

After a successful complementary therapy pilot in February we have been lucky enough to secure further funding for this project and we will begin our 3rd round of treatments this month. We hope to find out more from women how the following treatments could work best as a complementary part of our service:

Holistic massage
Reflexology 
Reiki
Weekly meditation class

The Maya Centre is continuing to evaluate the uptake, engagement and client satisfaction outcomes. 

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In our last newsletter we reported on our application to the Accreditation Programme for Psychological Therapies Services (APPTS).  A new national programme approved by the national body for psychological therapies and the Royal College of Psychiatrists.  
The application was submitted in early 2015, and we are  pleased to announce that the Maya Centre was awarded this prestigious accreditation at its first attempt, a significant achievement for this small organisation. Justine Pritchard led the application to achieve our APPTS accreditation, which was a significant piece of work as she rose to the challenge of interim Director. It widened our knowledge of other psychological therapies services and led to improvements in the systems which support our professional service delivery. Our new client network user network was involved in this process, enthusiastically taking part in the peer review interviews. 
This complements our registration with the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy, demonstrating to clients, commissioners and funders that they can have confidence in the professionalism of the Centre and its staff. 

Thanks to Justine and well done to everyone who took part!

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Trainees

Congratulations to our trainees Pat Brown, Dawn Estefan and Jessica Kabra, who have now qualified after their trainee placement of 2 years at the Maya Centre.
We are delighted to accept them as honorary counsellors and thank them for all their hard work.

Goodbye
We are saying farewell to Carole Jackson and Diane Rogan-Sofer, our Clinical Supervisors, who have worked at the Maya Centre for several years. We would like to thank them both for their commitment and support given to the Maya Centre and wish them well in their future plans.
 

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         ~ Community News Focus ~       

Open Afternoon

On the 22nd July the we hosted an open afternoon with the generous support of our local Sainsbury's and LUSH Cosmetics.

The afternoon was an opportunity for our service users to be involved in a development, delivery and evaluation of our services and to gain better understanding of what services we provide. They also enjoyed some wonderful hand pampering treatments courtesy of Lush employees, who came to visit our centre for the afternoon. 

Thank you to LUSH and to Sainsbury's for providing the refreshments for the event.

 

During the open afternoon our client focus group told us that they highly value the service that we provide. The Majority of our clients felt that Maya Centre should continue providing free individual and group therapies, with some services to be provided in other locations to accommodate the individual needs of clients.  

All clients felt that the complementary therapies should continue to run alongside our counselling therapy. A large majority would like Maya Centre to offer art therapy and opportunities for clients to engage in short projects and workshops. Half felt that our ‘Community Support’ and ‘Service Users Group’ should be available.
The feedback and comments from our clients have been most helpful in the review of our current services and planning for the future. We welcome feedback and comments from all our service users – please do get in touch with us if you would like to share yours.

The afternoon was also an opportunity for our clients to meet with Jude Habib, from Sound Delivery to discuss the 'My Voice Project' (as described above). There was a taster session, which generated a huge interest in clients wishing to take part. A big thank you to Jude for assisting us in delivering this forthcoming project, which gives a voice to women whose stories we don’t often hear and empowers women to find their voice.

It was a great pleasure to see so many of our clients enjoying the pampering sessions and willing to support the Maya Centre.  We would like to say thank you to all clients who attended and provided us with their feedback.

~ Service Users Group ~

The monthly Service Users Group provides continuous opportunity for all our clients to influence of how the organisation is run and to support the Maya Centre in providing services tailored to the needs of our clients. If you would like to join please contact Michalina on 020 7281 8970The next Service Users Group is held on Wednesday 7th October at 1pm

 

~ Your Voice Counts ~

Telephone advice session is held every Thursday 11am-1pm -you may call Michalina on 0207 272 0995 or email Michalina@mayacentre.org.uk

Face-to-face drop in sessions are held every Tuesday 1-3pm, except last Tuesdays of the month when legal advice takes place
 

Our Vision:
The Maya Centre will be a place of change and growth for women 

Thank you for your continued support!