Touch of Love Outreach was founded by Jane Akadiri in 2020, in the midst of the Covid 19 pandemic. The charity has grown and expanded over the past 4 years from offering a hot meal in the church hall to the vast services it offers today, with Jane as the driving force behind it all!
Jane, alongside three members of staff and over 30 volunteers, provide a variety of fantastic services in the Torry area.
For those unfamiliar with Touch of Love, they are a charity providing compassionate support from their homes on Grampian Road and Tullos Community Centre to families and ethnic/minority young people. Services they provide range from a foodbank, youth groups, employability support and a family hub.
Starting out originally serving a hot meal in lockdown, then moving on to distributing food parcels across the city before finally opening a Foodbank on Grampian Road and then once a week at Tullos.
Jane is determined that anyone who is hungry can walk into the foodbank and access their service. “If you are really hungry and feel that you need help and walk into the Foodbank, we will find something for you” explained Jane. “We won’t ask for a utility bill or any evidence, you don’t need to prove yourself.” There is a friendly face there to help, so make use of the service if you need, they will also make an effort to signpost to other organisations who can help too!
Touch of Love are thoughtful with each and every one of their endeavours, this is clear from the attention they have given to choosing their bases and what they do with them. After conducting a survey of their service users to find out what areas families must give priority to when it comes to spending, they discovered that parents felt that they couldn’t prioritise mental health and wellbeing activities for their children. So, Touch of Love, set about to provide a solution to this. Launching a children’s play scheme in 2022, they had over 200 sign-ups. From there, they started free youth groups throughout term time, thinking of everything down to the accessibility of the group, making sure they’d be on a main bus route. With Young Scot cards, the children can even get there for free too. Now they have over 60 young people every Friday, it is clear to see these services are valued and necessary.
The youth groups are not just about play however, while they do get to enjoy dance, music, signing, football and more, there is also a focus on building community and connections for these youngsters. It is a place where they can bond over their shared experiences. “They discuss their challenges and issues, sometimes you see them discussing systemic racism. They may have recognised that they are being treated differently to others at school and they speak to each other about it because they feel it’s a safe space for them to discuss these things.”
“We want people to come together, share their experiences, build that peer support. It’s very important in today’s changing world.”
Juggling the running of a charity, alongside her own business, Jane is a force to be reckoned with and whole heartedly deserves to be awarded for her it. Jane was recently recognised for her phenomenal work at the Black Scottish Awards, where she was nominated and won in the category of Outstanding Contribution to the African Community. While Jane does not do what she does for recognition or reward, this was undoubtedly a great achievement for her.
She said “I was so fortunate to be nominated, I don’t know who nominated me. You don’t do it for recognition, you do it because you want to fulfil a need and sometimes it might even be a need that you are also going through.”
Jane even continued to champion her young people on a night which should have been about her, securing them the opportunity to dance at the celebration.
Congratulations and well done to Jane and everyone at Touch of Love for all their hard work and dedication.
For those who would like to get involved in Touch of Love but are unsure of taking that step, to that, Jane says “It’s beautiful to try out new things and make new friends, you can never underestimate the power of being in a community.” So why not dive in.
To find out more about opportunities at Touch of Love and how to get involved, visit their website https://www.touchoflove.org.uk/index.html email [email protected] or call the helpline on +44 333 220 6029.