Nasio Exit 7
Exit 7 was originally developed by the Nasio Trust to help young people who were drifting into antisocial behaviour or had lost direction. Having seen the intensely positive effect that volunteering has on the lives and outlook of troubled youngsters – we quickly realised that the programme would be hugely beneficial for all people.
The focus of the Nasio Exit 7 programme was to empower young people to EXIT the SEVEN most common outcomes identified by the police service as negatively affecting, associated and linked with young people.
These were identified as:
- Anti-social behaviour
- Alcohol, drugs and solvent abuse
- Vandalism and criminal damage
- Violent crime (e.g. knife crime)
- Harassment and bullying
- Risk of offending and re-offending
- Gangs and loitering
This project aimed to motivate young people to ENTER a programme of SEVEN positive activities and therefore distracting from the seven negative outcomes.
The seven positive components were identified as:
- Personal Challenges
- Team Work
- Education
- Heath Awareness
- Mentoring
- Restorative
- Careers and apprenticeship planning.
We found that every young person benefited from the experience and every young person returned with a different attitude to life, their parents, their education and their life choices.
Not only that, but the programme also benefitted those people living in the poor Western Kenyan communities of Mumias and Musanda that we support. That is what makes this programme unique.
From these beginnings the programme has evolved. For some time now the programme has been developed to cover young people from all backgrounds – young people from state schools, private schools, youth clubs and church groups for those who have had personal difficulties and those who just want to develop themselves and have the experience of a lifetime.
The experience is truly life-changing no matter how much or how little you have at home or school. In the summer of 2014 boys from Eton College, before returning home after climbing Kilimanjaro, volunteered at the day care centres helping the orphans, getting to know them and doing practical tasks like building homes from the raw materials that are found locally working with local builders. They all said that it was the experience of a lifetime, one they would never forget.
The Nasio Trust no longer runs their EXIT7 programme in the UK but if a young person is interested in volunteering with the Nasio Trust in Kenya, please visit our volunteer website.
