THE Platform Project has received £36,500 to help young people improve their employability prospects during the pandemic.

The Social Enterprise Support Fund awarded the funding to the Swindon-based youth development firm.

The money will pay for sessions throughout each week which young people can join to gain work experience in running a youth magazine, a printed goods business, a digital media marketing agency, and a creative careers start-up service.

Platform Project founder Sadie Sharp said: "The rate of youth unemployment has dramatically increased during Covid-19 and the demand for our services has skyrocketed because there is even more competition for the reduced number of jobs.

"Our project helps young people improve their confidence and employability prospects by experiencing how to run a youth led business and work for themselves.

"This will really make their skill set and CV stand out on applications.

“This funding means the world to us and we were thrilled to find we’d been successful as it shows us that our approach has a lot of potential to help with the Covid recovery.

"Scaling up is a challenge for every business, but now we can move forward with the confidence that we have funds to support the increasing number of young people within our project over the coming months.”

The Platform Project has just celebrated its third birthday and has tripled in size each year since starting as a volunteer-led organisation.

Its annual income now stands at around £70,000 and helps around 60 young people each year.

The social enterprise started small and moved around community centres until 2018 when it secured a funded office in The Workshed , with sponsorship from Nationwide Building Society.

Then the project moved to its own youth-led shared workspace in Dorcan. Today, Sadie heads up the organisation with a board of directors and helps other organisations through her speaking, publishing and consultancy work.

To find out more or to volunteer as a mentor, visit: www.platformproject.co.uk

The Social Enterprises Support Fund provides essential financial support to help social enterprises during the pandemic to meet additional demands, change the way they work, make their spaces Covid-secure and manage liquidity during the next six months.