CornerstoneNews

www.cornerstone.org.uk

Cornerstone Direct is a new service launched in East Dunbartonshire, which is set to roll out across the country providing care and support to people in their own home. The new service will provide companionship and personal, home and specialist care to people of all ages with a wide range of support needs. The service aims to help people stay independent by providing assistance with tasks such as bathing, meal preparation, shopping and housework. The team of professional carers, who undergo comprehensive training before working with customers, also have the expertise to support people with more specialist needs such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s Disease.

Cornerstone Direct will guarantee customers and their families a quality service and peace of mind as Stephen Cuthew, the new service manager, explains, “I am delighted to be launching this new service in East Dunbartonshire. We recognise for many people the decision to seek care and support can be difficult and by working closely with families our service will help make the process easier for many.”

New service launches across the country

Autumn/Winter 2011

Cornerstone, has recently been awarded ‘Recognised for Excellence’ by Quality Scotland. We are the first voluntary organisation in Scotland to achieve this award which is part of a European-wide recognition scheme helping organisations to achieve business excellence. Cornerstone’s Quality Development team have been working hard over the last year to demonstrate their high levels of performance against criteria such as leadership, strategy and people results. Congratulating Cornerstone, Dave Bradley, Chief Executive of Quality Scotland commented, “Cornerstone stands out as a prime example of how a commitment to sustaining business excellence can bring about transformational change to a greatly respected organisation in relation to its staff development and best practice programmes.”

R e c o g n i s e d for Excellence

PwC ‘One Firm One Day’

As part of their ‘One Firm One Day’ initiative, 200 staff at PwC’s Glasgow Office committed 1,500 working hours to raise £2,104.18 for Cornerstone.

The day encouraged staff to participate in a range of volunteering and fundraising events around the theme of employability, with the aim of making a long lasting impact in the local community.

Cornerstone was selected as theircharity to support because our employment service met their social investment criteria for the ‘One Firm One Day’ initiative.

On the day a team of budding PwC ‘DIY experts’ painted and decorated the living and kitchen area of a flat in our Bridgeton service, and two volunteers spent time with the residents doing Day Activities in the local community centre.

In their Glasgow office staff fundraised through a dress down day, a coffee morning, bottle stall, limbo-ing and even Yahtzee. A big thank you to PwC staff for your fantastic volunteering and fundraising efforts.

PwC staff with Cornerstone’s Keep Safe Joe

Cornerstone Challenge Success!

Cornerstone News Autumn Winter 20112

The Cornerstone Challenge takes place each September and this year had an added twist as the twenty two teams involved were encouraged to walk, run and cycle as many miles as possible to travel around different Oscar themedlocations on a virtual map.

The Onshore Category winners were announced as newcomers ‘The Bridal Party’, consisting of school teacher Lizzie Hawkey, her friends and colleagues, who used the challenge to get fit for her upcoming wedding. The team were delighted that their efforts totaling 21,300 Cornerstone miles saw them

take home the trophy. Challenge veterans, The A(lwyn) Team Total, won the Offshore Category with 9,179 miles. Finally the Cornerstone Challenge Individual Highest Mileage Award went to Talisman Energy’s Gordon Cantlay

who travelled over 2,542 Cornerstone miles. The 30 day challenge is one of Cornerstone’s largest fundraising initiatives throughout the year and this year we raised over £22,600 for the people we support.

St James’s Place Foundation has given £2,500 to help support Cornerstone’s holiday play scheme for children with disabilities and other support needs in Aberdeen.

The donation will cover transport costs and ensure that the children are able to enjoy day trips. The service enables the children to keep developing their social skills and provides parents and carers with much needed respite.

Steve McKnight, senior partner of St James’s Place Partnership in Aberdeen said, “We are delighted to support Cornerstone’s play schemes, especially as the donation will benefit local children with learning disabilities”.

St James’s

The Bridal Party team at The Challenge awards ceremony collecting their trophy and certificate

A blended learning approach encompasses both classroom and E-Learning. What were the advantages of sitting the course just via E-Learning?E-Learning is a great resource as it reduces the time away from my day-to-day work and I don’t have to travel. It can easily be fitted around my other responsibilities. You can sit the course immediately rather than having to wait until a classroom course becomesavailable and there are fewer distractions than there can be in a classroom setting. Ultimately I like the feeling of taking responsibility for my learning.

Did you miss the interaction with colleagues? I didn’t really miss the interaction as sometimes there are only a few colleagues on a course anyway. Since the new course is more engaging and forces you to think for yourself it doesn’t matter that you’re studying independently.

Would the course suit everybody or do you have to be ‘an IT whizz’? The courses are very intuitive in design and you don’t need to be computer savvy to complete them.

Focus on E- learningCornerstone is championing E-Learning and currently has five courses in its portfolio. Each course is being upgraded creating an interactive, engaging and most importantly, fun way of learning. The courses can be undertaken when and where it suits you and can be completed in one go or on several visits; and the information is always accessible. There is no need to fear the technology either as it is designed for anyone with the most basic IT skills, if you can order on-line you’ll be fine! Cornerstone News met with Alison Davidson, Team Leader in Irvine, who recently completed our newly redesigned Food Hygiene course and asked her about Cornerstone’s latest E-Learning product.

They all operate in the same way and give clear instructions on screen as you go along. As long as less confident people are given the support on how to log on and start for the first time, they will be able to take on any of the courses. If anything, I’ve found that using E-Learning can help to build confidence in staff that are less comfortable with using computers.

How long did the course take you ? The courses take a maximum of an hour and it’s possible to stop and then restart if something else crops up. However it records how long you take to complete it, so I wouldn’t run through it in five minutes! The freedom of the course is that you

can go at your own pace. If you need a bit of extra time to process information, then you can, you don’t get dragged on ahead as you might in a classroom setting.

What did you enjoy about the Food Hygiene course? I think the new food hygiene course is great, really flexible as I could sit it when it suited me and I didn’t have to be away from the service. I felt it was very interactive with different formats throughout to keep me interested. I can clearly remember large sections of the course in great detail a month after I took it, and how often can you say that?

visit www.cornerstone.org.uk/e-learning

Who’s that guy with Thomas McMahon?

Thomas McMahon and his support worker Patt Strickland went into Glasgow to watch the filming of Brad Pitt’s new movie, World War Z. When they got there they waited with the rest of the public, watching the action and waiting for Brad to appear.

Patt asked a policewoman if it was possible for Thomas to meet Brad (no harm in asking).The police officer came back to say “that she had passed the message on”.

Thomas was enjoying his first time on a movie set when Chris, a member of the film crew, came and ushered them down to the trailer, ecstatic they waited to meet the star.

Suddenly Brad strolled out of his trailer to the sound of screaming girls, walked straight over to

Thomas and Patt and said “Hi, Do you mind if I spend some time with you guys?”

He shook hands and had his picture taken with Thomas. Patt, being a cartoonist drew a thank you picture, and made everyone zombies including Mr Pitt!

The question on everyone’s lips was, “Who’s that guy with Thomas McMahon?”

Coffee anyone?

Cornerstone have opened a new café in Gowkthrapple in Wishaw and it’s already proving popular with local residents. Cornerstone operate the café in partnership with NHS Lanarkshire and Garrion People’s Housing Co-operative, at the new Centrepoint building. The café is open on a Monday and Tuesday and serves a selection of hot and cold snacks.

A competition was held to name the café, and the winner was local Helen Aston who chose Orchard View, taking inspiration from the Children’s Orchard that the café looks onto.

Marathon Success

Staff members, Liz Delaney and Alison Kenna, have been running together for the last five years and have successfully completed four half marathons to date. They recently added the Edinburgh Marathon to that list, raising a fantastic £1110 for Cornerstone!

Cornerstone News Autumn Winter 20114

Calum McMahon, whom we support, recently took part in the Welsh Games entering the 60 metre sprint, long jump and the shot putt.

Calum attends an athletics class on Monday evening and trained all year to prepare for the Games. His hard work paid off, as Calum returned home to Airdrie with a Gold medal and a special recognition for the 60 metre sprint, a Silver medal for the long jump, and he came 5th in the shot putt. Calum’s mum said, “I have never been so proud of my son, seeing him win his medals was fantastic and a huge achievement for him”.

Sport Star

FundraisersThe Dundee Domiciliary service raised £3000 for a specially adapted chair for one of the young men they support.

Cornerstone News Autumn Winter 20115

The Rank Foundation has made an investment of £10,000 in our Fundraising team by inviting Kirsty Fraser, fundraising intern, to join their Time to Shine Internship programme.

Cornerstone will use the £10,000 funding towards Kirsty’s salary during the 12 month placement, which will see Kirsty join a group of 15 Interns from charities across the UK as part of an innovative new development programme to attract young graduates to the voluntary sector.

Kirsty can expect to gain valuable, hands-on experience in an exciting yet challenging fundraising environment. She will also access training and professional development opportunities provided by The Rank Foundation, whilst making a vital contribution to enable Cornerstone in achieving the aims outlined in the Fundraising Action Plan 2011-13.

Since joining Cornerstone in August, Kirsty has developed a Fundraising Toolkit to help staff, people we support, their families and individuals to fundraise on behalf of Cornerstone. From organising Race Nights or Raffles to getting help setting up a fundraising page, the toolkit has something for everyone. The toolkit will be available for download from January 2012, keep an eye on our website www.cornerstone.org.uk for more info

Kirsty’s Time to Shine

A tea party was held at our Riverside service in Aberdeenraising £52.80. Well done to everyone for their hard work and for putting on the event.

A pub quiz with raffle prizes, sandwiches, stovies and karaoke all raised £357 for Bob Cooney Court in Aberdeen enabling the team to make amendments to the house. Thanks to everyone who came along and made it a good night.

Holiday clubs make summer fun

Our Fun Clubs & Holiday Playschemes provided an additional 1, 550 hours of support over the summer holidays to children with disabilities and other support needs.

The children had a fun packed summer, taking part in new

activities such as ice skating, tubing, picnics, ten pin bowling, sensory walks, berry picking & smoothie making. The respite that the clubs provide is invaluable to the families of the children we support. Our service can provide a break for parents to enjoy on their own or with other members of the family.

The fun clubs and play schemes also provided families with respite over the school October holidays and they are already planning more activities for the year ahead. To find out more about the service please visit www.cornerstone.org.uk

The children visiting a fire station for the day

““

The West Dunbartonshire Transitions Project work locallyto assist young people and their families through the challenging time of transition from child to adult services. The team work alongside young people with learning disabilities, Autism Spectrum Disorder and/or ADHD to facilitate them and their families with planning for their future. The progression from childhood to adulthood can be a very uncertain and anxious period for young people. However, when the move involves a young person with a disability, the challenges they and their family face can seemoverwhelming.

Many struggle with personal relationships so this summer, in addition to the project, the Transitions team decided to bring some of the young peopletogether to work on a group art project. The aim was to build the young people’s confidence and give them the opportunity to practice their interpersonal skills in a safe environment.

Creative Friends

The group was a great success and gradually each of the young people became more comfortable working together and friendships grew. The staff were fantastic, and those who led the sessions participated in train-ing to gain insight into the challenges our young people face on a daily basis.

A participant of the class with his mural

It was overwhelming to watch their development each week and the art work pieces they produced were really beautiful.

The smiling faces throughout this workshop are evidence of the success of this intiative. We hope to be in a position to provide a wider range of activities in the future.

The West Dunbartonshire Transitions

Project is a partnership project between

Share Scotland and Cornerstone, funded

by the Big Lottery.

If you want something extra special to send to friends and family this xmas, then look no further than our limited edition cards, with an image from Scottish artist Francis Boag. @CornerstoneScot

Our TASK group in the west held a

Halloween party, with superheros,

devils and romans, a fun and spooky

night!

Cafe Success

Chapelside Café in Airdrie, part of our Employment service, was recently presented with the Development of Local Community Services award by the Provost of North Lanarkshire Council. Well done to the team for developing the Employment service at the café and to the people we support who work there.

Cornerstone’s Alan McGinness and the café staff accepting the award

Margaret Sarah Sullivan collecting her certificate for IT Learning Achievement

Cornerstone News Autumn Winter 20116

Participants collecting their certificates

Healthy Working Lives

What a weight to goCongratulations to John Liddell, whom we support in his own home in Glasgow. Four years ago John weighed over 22 stone and had various health related issues that had a big impact on his life. With the help of his Cornerstone key worker, Betty Hough, who promoted healthy eating and exercise, he has successfully achieved his target weight by losing an amazing 10 stone. John extends his sincere appreciation to Betty for her support and motivation to realise this goal.

Over the last two years Cornerstone has strived to promote a healthier and safer environment for staff by working towards the Silver Healthy Working Lives Award, which we were delighted to achieve this October. The Healthy Working Lives teams across Scotland have encouraged and supported staff to participate in a wide range of activities including the Cornerstone Challenge, Get Fit in February, Know your Numbers and Alcohol Awareness Week. Cornerstone invested in Mentally Healthy Workplace training for managers to ensure they have the appropriate skills to improve mental health and well being in the workplace. This course supports our absence management programme and has helped managers develop skills in this area.

Our services in Moray have been embracing Health Working Lives with the local walking group being particularly active, organising 54 walks over 25 weeks, ranging from 1.5 miles for beginners to 14 miles for the fitter members of the group.

The Moray team have also organised a sponsored slim, set up a running club and have a group ready to take part in the sporting initative Gold Challenge.

Elsewhere staff have been active, with Airdrie organising 3 a side football and the Glasgow office tried 5 a side football.

In the East Region, activities have included a pedometer challenge in association with the British Heart Foundation, a talk and demonstration highlighting the health benefits of Aloe Vera and a number of staff took part in the Big Fun Run.

Sponsored Walk along Aberdeen beach

In Aberdeen, staff organised a sponsored walk along the beach front and the people we support collected an impressive £319.10.

Keith Taylor, Cornerstone’s Head of Business Development, completed a gruelling fundraising cycle from John O’Groats to Land’s End raising much needed funds for Cornerstone. Well done!

At our Dalmarnock service, staff used their own time to complete a nail care course to enable them to provide female residents with advice and treatments at no cost. One staff member has also completed a holistic massage course. These treatments are done both within the service and at the new Cornerstone day service. Staff do nail art and hand massages in the weekly beauty therapy hour and feel it is beneficial for the ladies by providing a good source of relaxation. Staff are looking to complete further courses including a basic gardening course, Indian head massage and more nail art courses.

Cycling success for Keith

Beauty courses to benefit people we support

Fundraisers

Our Berrybank service in Aberdeenshire held a very successful Coffee Morning & Plant Sale raising a fantastic £1700 for Cornerstone.

Staff promote the Cornerstone Challenge

Cornerstone brought a pedal powered pop up cinema to Aberdeen for the first time. Those who attended pedalled on six stationary bikes to screen the film Casablanca, launching the Cornerstone Challenge.

Pedal Power

Supporters powering Casablanca

Edel Harris, Lynn Batham and Sarah Dawson

TREND magazine supports our volunteer serviceWe are pleased to announce that TREND magazine has donated a cheque for £2,500 from the funds raised at their recent Life With Style Awards. Lynne Batham (pictured) presented the cheque to our Chief Executive, Edel Harris and volunteer Sarah Dawson. Edel commented, “We are delighted to receive this cheque from TREND in aid of our Volunteer Service. This donation will go towards a new recruitment campaign which will help us to enable the people we support to enjoy a valued life in our community. My thanks go to everyone at TREND and their generous guests who attended the awards ceremony.”

Moray hold Family Fun DayWe held a family fun day in August at Cooper Park in Elgin. The event was well attended with free activities for all ages including tug of war, treasure hunt, family fun races, face painting, bouncy castle and a raffle which was drawn by local Gladiator winner Kathryn Evans. One of the biggest hits on the day was the pedal powered smoothie maker! Everyone who came had a great day out and it was a fantastic way to raise awareness of Cornerstone in the Moray region.

Each year Cornerstone holds its AGM and two review events in the East and West regions. The AGM incorporates the financial reports for the year and all events recognise long serving staff, SVQ recipients and our volunteers. This year guests came to present Cornerstone with our Recognised for Excellence Award, National Autistic Society Accreditation and Healthy Working Lives Silver Award.

Wee timerous beastieCornerstone are holding their first Fundraising Burns Supper in partnership with Help for Kids Dundee this coming January. Guest speakers include journalist Lesley Riddoch, Scottish Rugby veteran Finlay Calder and photographer Andy Hall, whose stunning images of Scotland will be exhibited on the night. Tables and tickets are now on sale for the event which takes place on 26th January at Invercarse Hotel in Dundee. Please contact Sonia Jordan on 01382 220238 or visit www.cornerstone.org.uk for more info.

Andy Hall’s photograph of a Robert Burns bust

Ronald Troup, one of the residents at

our Berrybank service in Aberdeenshire

celebrated his 60th birthday by

throwing a party for family and friends

at Maud Social Club. As a surprise for

Ronald there was a piper who

performed a medley of songs.

t h eb i g

60In 2011 we celebrated The European Year of Volunteering and we want to extend a warm thank you to all our volunteers who give their time to enhance the lives of the people we support either through befriending, event support, office admin or activity enabling.

Cornerstone News Autumn Winter 20118

The Moray TASK group held a picnic at Roseisle and despite the unpredictable weather it was a great turn out. Those who attended took a walk along the beach, entered a photography competition and participated in activities in the woods. The TASK group members prepared lots of rolls and snacks for the picnic, and everyone had a fantastic time on the day catching up with friends.

TASK picnic

Some of the TASK members at the picnic

The Transitions service in Dundee has been operational since April 2011 and currently supports young people aged 14-18 years. This provision, part of our Dundee Children’s Community Support service, is currently funded by external grants and we hope to secure further financial support to enable it to continue for another two years as the feedback from the families has been very positive.

Transitions

Our fostering service in North Ayrshire has had a great year, with a team of six foster carers supporting 40 children through 1000 overnight stays.

We are looking to expand our fostering services so held a media campaign during Foster Care Fortnight which was supported by

Fostering fortnight scoresRangers player Lee McCulloch, whose mum works for Cornerstone. Our campaign was successful resulting in a number of enquiries and we are currently recruiting new carers throughout the West of Scotland. The service has recently been awarded £5,000 from Cycle Scotland to purchase a range of bikes and safety equipment. Two of the foster carers will become qualified cycle instructors to help teach the children about cycling and road safety. This funding will help the children develop new skills and promote their health and well-being and will also support our Healthy Working Lives initiative.

The Community Justice Service is working in partnership with Strathclyde Police to develop a training and information pack for police officers to enable them to deal more appropriately and effectively with people with learning disabilities. This work is accompanied by research on how people with learning disabilities experience contact with the police, the results should be available by Spring 2012.

p a r t n e r s h i p

Date for the diaryOur annual fundraising dinner will be held at The Marcliffe Hotel in Aberdeen on the 26th April 2012. Tickets are on sale fromvanessa.smith@cornerstone.org.uk

Lee with the SPL cup and Dylan Martin who issupported by our Foster Care Service

In July we held a party for the children we support in Dumbarton. The invitation was extended to the children of the staff who had fundraised for the party. Everyone had a good time on the day, the children had their faces painted, played on a bouncy castle, met the fire service and Freddie Whizz came along to entertain them for free!

P - A - R -T-Y

One of the party testing out his fireman skills

Cornerstone News Autumn Winter 20119

There are lots of ways you can support Cornerstone

Please visit www.cornerstone.org.uk for more information

Make a donation

Fundraise for us

Become a member of Cornerstone

Visit our social network pagesBecome a Volunteer

Attend Cornerstone events

What did you want to be when you were growing up? I wanted to join the Foreign Office and work in an embassy in some far-flung part of the world.Marriage and two children in my mid-twenties put paid to that....but luckily I have since been able to travel widely all over the world for pleasure, rather than for work. One of my themes has been to follow the Silk Road from China to the Mediterranean, with Uzbekistan and Iran being my highlights.

What was your first job? If you discount a summer-job picking strawberries when I was 14 (character-forming!),my first job was teaching a range of adult education classes in European civilisation; German and English as a Foreign Language. I soon moved on to becoming involved with adult learning in deprived parts of Glasgow, which included my first involvement with adults with a learning disability.

Who inspires you? My inspiration has always come from people I have worked with. For example, teaching as

fJoin us on facebook!

Befriend ‘Cornerstone Charity’ to keep up with all the latest news and events. The page also acts as a forum for staff, supporters and people we support to share photos and stories about Cornerstone.

Getting to knowyou.... Helen MunroCornerstone Board Member

Cornerstone News Autumn Winter 201110

a group of women in Easterhouse and celebrating with them when they achieved exam passes; helping a young man, excluded from school, to join the army; enabling community activists to establish a service for drug-users in their local community; having a real conversation with a severely learning disabled young man about my new car...when before he wouldn’t even look at anyone. I suppose my main driver is being involved with whatever realises the potential of any individual.

What do you think being a Cornerstone Board Director means?Having a belief in, and commitment to, the aim of Cornerstone.Accepting that being a director means focussing on areas like budgets, quality assurance, risk management and governance-all of which are vitally important - so as to ensure the longer term viability of the Cornerstone brand and its services.

The instructor Jim and Sarah Bremner from AVC terrified before the jump

Take a Dive

A team from AVC Media Enterprises decided to skydive for their 30:30 Challenge, which was ourfundraising initiative to celebrate our 2010 30th Anniversary. It has taken 13 months for the AVC team to get the perfect weather to do the challenge, but they finally took to the skies and completed the dive. They raised a fantastic £5000 for Cornerstone!