Young folks get pleasure from a summer season of friendship and enjoyable at this 12 months’s SHINE programme

Published
18 September 2025

Young folks throughout West Dunbartonshire benefited from free summer season vacation camps providing enjoyable and friendship over the varsity holidays.  

The Council invested £100k this 12 months together with £19,993 from the Scottish Government to help new and current teams to supply a variety of exercise periods through the college holidays.  The well-liked occasions had been very effectively attended, together with locations for youngsters with extra help wants.

This 12 months’s programme, with the help from 22 group companions, offered a variety of periods to households, with focused help for individuals who wanted it most.

West Dunbartonshire Community Foodshare supported 700 youngsters by offered 350 brunch luggage consisting of 5 days price of breakfast, lunches, snacks and packed lunches throughout each week of the summer season break supported by their mixed SHINE and Cash for Kids funding.

More than 1,500 households attended occasions on the Golden Friendship Halls and Y-Sort-it supported Young Carers with a variety of day journeys together with a fishing journey and a stroll on  the West Highland Way. Their programme was designed to help over 2000 locations.

Vale of Leven Football Club ran a extremely popular soccer camp with 52 youngsters attending their enjoyable coaching and training periods.  Children took half in soccer drills and video games that promoted confidence, talent constructing and inclusion with the membership serving 260 meals as a part of the programme.  

Young folks loved the STEM and Virtual Reality actions at Bellsmyre Digital Club with the membership offering 192 lunches. Ben View handled youngsters to a variety of day journeys to the cinema, Flip Out, Heads of Ayr and Blair Drummond Safari Park.

Tullochan delivered a four-day exercise programme to 79 younger folks consisting of eight structured periods. Each day included each indoor and out of doors actions, together with the supply of breakfast and lunch to all. The younger folks took half in out of doors actions together with seashore combing periods with metallic detectors in Levengrove Park, artistic arts and craft periods, bushcraft and fire-pit periods. The indoor actions included crew constructing video games, films and enjoying board video games.

Along with native suppliers, the Council additionally supported particular person households with younger folks with anadditional help want. Fun and interesting actions had been supplied to 133 youngsters with 383 day periods offered by specialist settings. This in depth help ensured continuity of care and social alternatives for pupils with complicated extra help wants.

Pupils benefited from the constant help of acquainted workers members who’ve constructed a deep understanding of the kids’s particular person wants and fostered a secure and trusting surroundings, permitting for significant engagement in all actions. Children and younger folks had been handled to a variety of actions to satisfy their various pursuits and developmental wants with Active Schools, Bikeability periods, artistic arts with Clifftop Projects and artistic dance periods led by our companions at Indepen-dance.

The ASN SHINE programme made glorious use of the services at Kilpatrick School, together with the journey playground, delicate play space, and the newly created sensory backyard. These periods offered distinctive and stimulating environments tailor-made to the pupils’ wants and offered 189 lunches.

The Council acquired very constructive suggestions from dad and mom and carers of youngsters who attended the summer season programme. Feedback from younger folks, dad and mom and carers included ‘This is the third time my 7-year-old has attended. He loved it every day. The coaches go out of their way to make all the children feel safe and welcome.’; ‘Children formed new friendships, even among those who were unfamiliar with each other at the start of the week. Coaches reflected on a smooth, positive experience, thanks to their increasing experience in running the programme’; ‘I am really grateful for the chance to have good, fun activities to go to with my children. With money being tighter this year, it has been really hard to budget for nice extras’; ‘The sessions ran as planned and were well received by the young people who took part in them. The range of activities ensured that the young people participating had an enjoyable time. We provided the young people breakfasts and lunches ensuring they were well nourished whilst attending the sessions.’

Councillor Clare Steel, Convener of Educational Services stated: “I can’t underestimate how a lot households depend on the SHINE programme over the vacation to maintain the kids busy and get a lot wanted lunches and snacks on the occasions. I used to be delighted to go to a number of the organisers over the summer season holidays and personally thank them for his or her dedication to supporting native youngsters and households. I want to thank everybody concerned in arranging this very profitable programme which supplied elevated studying alternatives and enjoyable actions for gratis to oldsters. We have constructed an ideal partnership with native organisations and thru working collectively we supplied a really profitable summer season of enjoyable actions and forming friendships. 

“I am particularly pleased to see places offered to support families with children who need additional support. It is also very encouraging to see the very positive feedback from parents and carers which shows how popular these activities are to the children and their families.”

Councillor John Millar, Vice Convener of Educational Services, stated: “It’s very encouraging to hear how popular these activities have been and great to read the positive feedback from families and children who benefited.  I would like to thank the partner organisations who worked with the Council in offering fun and engaging programmes and meals over the holidays. During my visits over the holidays I was able to see firsthand how important this support is to families which is evident in the feedback we have received from parents and carers.”