Community engagement is a vital element of our work as we aim to shift and provide counter narrative to the negative migration rhetoric through story-telling and media. We recognise that engaging with our communities and support hub aid our progress in raising awareness throughout the UK and ensuring young people with precarious status know they are not alone and they have a voice. We’ve learned that through collective actions change is possible.
Our community consists of:
Young migrants – age 16-25 from Commonwealth background who arrived in the UK as children, caught within the complex immigration system who are prevented from living a fulfilled life. These are the very people we serve by supporting, advocating and fighting for equal treatment as their British born peers.
Schools and Universities – teachers, lecturers and faculties have some level of responsibility in assisting those in their care. These include young people with precarious status who might be struggling to obtain status, access higher education or are dealing with mental health issues because of their situation. We partner with various schools and universities across the UK and provide resources to help support young people in such situations.
Faith Institutions – connecting with faith leaders to help promote and raise awareness of the injustice young migrants face with the hope of identifying those within their communities who are in similar situations and referring them to us for help.
Allies and Supporters – we have a pool of organisations and individuals who continue to support our work through encouragement, collaboration, partnership, funding and provision of resources. This makes the work we do in the community possible and without them, We Belong wouldn’t be as successful as it is today.
The wider public – we use social media to promote our work online, involving the rest of the community who may otherwise have not heard of our situation and we continue to grow our online community by showcasing our everyday realities.