About Red Balloon - North East

We are working to establish the first Red Balloon Learner Centre in the North East of England.  We don't yet have our own premises, but we can already support children who need our help through our outreach service.  If you'd like to know more, please contact our co-ordinator, Paul Lawrence.

Our outreach service is based in Newcastle, but is being developed to support appropriate students from across the North East.  Our first Learner Centre is likely to be within the Tyne & Wear Metro conurbation or South East Northumberland area, but will continue to host an outreach service for the wider region.  We recognise that further centres may be needed elsewhere in the region in due course, but – for purely practical reasons – we are focusing our initial efforts where we believe they will have the greatest impact.

If you're a Key Stage 3 or 4 teacher, whether working or not, and would like to help us tutor vulnerable children in the North East, please contact our co-ordinator.

If you'd like to make a donation to help support our work, you can do so easily online via BT MyDonate , or by text ... or perhaps you might like to consider a standing order?  We'll be most grateful for whatever you can afford and will ensure that that everything we receive is used to help vulnerable children in the North East.

If you'd like to sponsor some of our events or activities please  contact our fundraising team.

If you're thinking of arranging your own fundraising activities, there are some great ideas available here.

If you're interested in learning more about our service, you may find the information below helpful - or please feel free to contact us.

Schools and Children’s services

The aim of Red Balloons is the recovery of bullied children. We provide an ‘intensive care’ education for children aged between 9 to 18 who have been severely bullied and/or are unable to attend school becasue of anxieties they experience as a result of their vulnerabilities.

We offer the students whom we accept a safe environment with clear boundaries for behaviour and an individual full-time academic, pastoral and therapeutic programme.

Once the students have regained their confidence and are able to cope academically and socially, we support them in their return to mainstream school, their entry to further education or into employment.

Each Red Balloon Learner Centre usually takes up to fifteen young people.  Our outreach service works with smaller groups in a variety of different safe locations.

Who do we take?

We accept any child who cannot access mainstream education because of bullying and/or anxieties they experience as a result of their vulnerabilities and for whom funding is available, on five conditions:

• there is a vacancy;
• the Coordinator and staff are confident that the Centre can offer the child the help they need;
• the child wants to come and will attend regularly;
• the child wants to learn and make academic progress; and
• the child agrees to behave with respect and consideration at all times.

Red Balloon Learner Centres have taken many students with statements of special educational needs, including social, behavioural and emotional difficulties.

Procedures for new students

Students can be referred by:

• their Local Authority;
• a parent or legal guardian;
• their school.

The referral process for a Red Balloon Learner Centre is outlined below.  We follow essentially the same process for our outreach service, with minor modifications to account for the fact that the interactions between staff and students may take place in a variety of different, but equally safe, locations.

• The referring party completes an official referral form (a request for which can be made to our Coordinator) accompanied by parental permission.
• A meeting with the parent(s)/legal guardian and child is arranged at which it is determined whether Red Balloon is an appropriate placement for the child.
• If we consider that it is, we will ask the student to think about whether they would like to take up a place.
• If they say they do, we arrange a taster day. so that they can see what Red Balloon is like.
• If, after the taster day, the student decides to come, and the staff think it is an appropriate placement, speedy enrolment is organised.
• The starting date is chosen so that the new student has time to get ready and RB can prepare current students and staff for the new arrival.
• A letter is sent to the parent/carer repeating the conditions under which the student has been accepted, giving start date, including a registration form and an information pack with suggestions of what they should bring with them on the first day, contact details, term dates and all relevant policies, including Child Protection, Anti-Bullying and Complaints.
• A telephone call is made to the student the day before they arrive, in order to reassure them.

On the day of arrival:

• all the students and staff wear name labels;
• one of the current students or support staff will look after the new arrival;
• the timetable and general procedures, such as taking shoes off in the house, are explained; and
• in the afternoon or evening after the first day, the parent/carer is asked how they think things have gone.

What happens when students recover?

Once a student has gained enough self-confidence to start thinking about leaving Red Balloon and moving back to 'the outside world', the staff of Red Balloon work with them to determine an exit strategy.  At this stage the parents and the Local Authority are brought into the discussion.  Decisions have to be made about the student's next step, where they will go (back to their old school, to another school, to college, into employment etc), what support they will need and what the timescale will be.

If the student is in Year 10 or 11, they will probably stay at Red Balloon even though they have recovered from the effects of bullying, as schools are reluctant to take them once the GCSE courses have begun.  In such cases, those students will be given special responsibilities in the Red Balloon community, as well as the opportunity for targeted work experience (going out once a week for two or more months to a local business).

Our expertise lies in recovering children who have been bullied from the effects of that bullying.  Sometimes we take students who have been severely bullied and who have other conditions such as Asperger's, dyspraxia or learning difficulties.  Once the student feels they have come to terms with what happened to them, have gained self-respect and learned strategies for coping appropriately with anger (their own and other people’s) and with unkind behaviour, it is time for them to move on, and we work with other agencies to find an appropriate placement.

February 2012