Yelling Village

If you live in Yelling, Graveley or Toseland you will recently have received a survey entitled ‘Your community, Your Say’.

Thank you to all of you who returned it, we had an excellent response (22%) and it has been really useful in finding out what matters to you all.

Original Response-

Our task was to identify 1) The greatest needs, 2) Those ideas which were plausible 3) Those things we could act upon in the present 4) Those things we would address in the future.
1)Greatest needs

a)Sports
b)Shop
c)More social events & clubs in general
d)Meeting place/facilities for children
e)Pub
f)Post Office
g)Regular bus/transport
h)Safety in general
i)Events at the Chapel

2) Plausible ideas

a)Sports- unfortunately the chapel doesn’t have the facilities for any sports activities, though it is worth bringing up in other community meetings  that this is an identified need.
b)Shop - We considered the possibility of running a shop ourselves but felt that this was not an area we could dedicate ourselves to for personnel and legal reasons. It was decided a shop would better serve this community if we could encourage a local business to get involved. More research is required.
c)More social events & clubs in general - There was a concern not to conflict with the excellent activities already taking place in the villages. For this reason we shall seek to support activities already being held in the villages, as well as helping out at these larger events. We may also look into running extra events for the villages to compliment those already running and helping to increase advertising and exposure of any village events.
d)Meeting place/facilities for children - Youth groups are already run by the Chapel. Tots and Carers is also plausible. It may be possible to install a play area at the back of the chapel, subject to demand.
e)Pub - The social club at Yelling Village Hall was considered sufficient, and has better facilities than we can offer.
f)Post Office - This is not really a feasible venture as there is no one in the membership who could run this as a business franchise. This information will be passed on, however, and as a Chapel we would welcome either a Post Office or Shop amenity.
g)Regular bus/transport - It may be possible to start a petition to Stagecoach, or organise a car sharing initiative. We would be willing, as a Chapel, in supporting this.
h)Safety in general- It may be possible to hold consultations with the police about road safety, or offer a chaperoning service to village events.
i) Services proposed by the Chapel- All ideas we put forward were plausible from our point of view, and all were well received in varying degrees. We will aim, within our capabilities, to establish these services over the coming months.

3)Forthcoming action (As at April 2010)

a)Meeting place/facilities for children- A Tots & Carers group will be started after Easter holidays. More people showed a preference for a morning group than afternoon group. It was mentioned that it should be at a time when groups in St Neots are not taking place. Unfortunately those members who will start the group are unavailable in the mornings. Consequently the group will take place on either a Monday or Wednesday afternoon, when to our knowledge there isn’t a group running in St Neots. This can be subject to change should another day/time suit the community better.
Social events - For Ladies the Coffee, Craft & Chat once a month has been extended so there are activities for Ladies (of any age), every Tuesday. No other groups will be started yet, but we will consider them for the future.
c) Services proposed by the Chapel
i)The most popular event was ‘Cafe Nights with Speakers’. This will start after Easter holidays, initially on the second Saturday of the month, in the evenings. Film nights, curry nights & games nights were also popular. Initially these will be incorporated into the cafe nights. Quiz nights, despite being popular, already take place at Yelling village hall so we propose to increase our support of these, rather than starting our own in the Church.
ii)Tots & Carers has been discussed above.
iii)We have made our Sunday service more ‘Contemporary’ but would welcome feedback from members of the community who attend. All are welcome and we would love to see you. There wasn’t sufficient response about a service on a weekday to warrant starting one at present
d) Youth Work
The two youth groups currently run will be continued. An older youth group received positive response and is something we will continue to explore. Currently the ‘Yell’ youth group will be run weekly, on Friday nights, as a relaxed area where any young person can come along and ‘drop in’. We feel this incorporates the older youth, as well as maintaining the youth group. ‘Young Yell’ kids club will continue in its current format for 6-11 year olds on the first and third Friday nights of each month.

4)Future action

a) The internet cafe was a popular idea. An internet service has been installed at the Chapel ready for this, but the Cafe itself is not likely to start until after the summer. We will discuss how often it is to take place and how it is to be staffed in the meantime.
b) A DIY course is likely to be held in the summer.
c) An Explore Course to find out about Christianity will be run by the Chapel when there is an increased demand. At present, the course run by St Neots Evengelical church in the town will be made available to those who are interested.
d) We are exploring possibilities for future childrens’ clubs run during school holidays.
e) Homework Help may be started in the new school year, depending on the helpers available. We are currently speaking to some contacts in the area about the best way forward.

Update-

We started a regular Cafe in December in place of the irregular “Cafe nights with speakers”. This incorporates several of the above ideas, with a space for youth, an internet facility, and a fairtrade basics stall (the closest we can get to a shop!)

The tots group has been well attended since September (it has moved to Wednesday mornings).

We have had to close the youth groups for now,  but we hope the youth will enjoy their new place in the community cafe. A local Youth worker attends the Café once a month to chat to the teenagers.