The Ministry of Defence, in partnership with YHA (Youth Hostel Association), is organising short holidays to support families who have lost a loved one in military service. Families’ Activity Breaks, also known as FAB camps, are activity holidays which features activities like building rafts, abseiling, rock climbing and flying down zip wires.

The aim of the camps is to provide a safe, and nurturing atmosphere for families to deal with their grief and meet with other families who have been through a similar experience.

This summer camps are taking place in Coverack in Cornwall, Whitby in North Yorkshire, Conwy in North Wales and Cairngorm in Scotland. The camps run from the 24^th July until the 26^th August 2010.

The pilot FAB camp took place at the YHA Youth Hostel in Coverack, Cornwall in August 2009 and sounddelivery was invited by YHA and the MOD to speak to the families taking part in the holiday. This short video captures the holiday atmosphere and highlights the real value of the FAB camp.

To find out more about FAB please go to www.fabcamps.org.uk

Earlier this year YHA commissioned a report to highlight the benefits of their Do It 4 Real Summer Camps. The aim of the research was to provide evidence of the benefits and impacts of going on a Di4R summer camp. Surveys were conducted before during and after camp with the young people and their parents/guardians. We were asked to help give the report some publicity and arrange some press interviews.

We managed to secure coverage on many local BBC radio stations including BBC Radio Cornwall, BBC Radio Derby, BBC Radio Manchester and BBC Radio Leicester. Many of these stations also broadcast pre-recorded audio clips that we had recorded previously to add a fresh element to their broadcasts.

Here you can listen to the interview mother and son Tracy and Joe did with BBC Radio Leicester:

Many of the broadcasters took some of our broadcast clips to help illustrate their coverage, including this short testimony from Sarah who’s been on a number of Di4R camps. You can listen to her story below:

We also headed up the social media campaign during the ccampaign, ensuring the public could interact with what was going on. This saw the number of Twitter followers to the Do It 4 Real account more triple, and a sustantial increase to the Facebook group.

Family Activity Breaks (FAB) provide bereavement support, adventure activities and peer support in the aftermath of a family’s loss. The aim is to provide a safe and nurturing atmosphere for families to deal with their grief and meet other people who have been through a similar experience. FAB is a partnership between the Armed Forces, YHA (Youth Hostels Association) and the Ministry of Defence. sounddelivery has worked to support this project since pilot camps were run last summer. We were recently asked to provide support for the project by getting regional coverage for a 6 day charity bike ride from YHA Coverack in Cornwall to YHA Whitby in Yorkshire – a journey of almost 600 miles. The cyclists included YHA staff and military personnel.

We managed to secure coverage on many regional BBC and Commercial radio stations including BBC Radio Cornwall, BBC Radio Derby, regional Heart stations, BBC Radio Gloucestershire and BFBS: the station broadcasting to British military personnel. Many of these stations also broadcast pre-recorded audio clips that we had recorded previously to add a fresh element to their broadcasts.

Here you can listen to the interview YHA staffer Mick Horan did with BBC Radio Gloucestershire on day 3 of the mammoth cycle ride:

Many of the broadcasters took some of our broadcast clips to help illustrate their coverage, with Chelsey’s moving talk about how FAB gave her confidence back being particularly popular. You can listen to this piece below:

We also headed up the social media campaign during the cycle, ensuring that the public could interact with the campaign. This saw the number of Twitter followers to the Friends of FAB account more than double, the Facebook group jump in use and over 150 photos and videos added around the web!

The cycle has so far raised more than £20,000 for FAB – a fantastic amount for a great project! We’re really looking forward to seeing what else this amazing project can achieve.

Every summer YHA hostels are over-run with teenagers for the annual DoIt4Real season – 6 weeks of camps across the UK. The holidays are open to young people aged between 10 and 19 in an array of different activities including everything from quad-biking, rock climbing and surfing to video-making, caving and abseiling. Each year YHA recruits an army of keen, energetic young people to volunteer at the camps to support the work of YHA staff. The volunteering team at YHA wanted to create a short video to help with their recruitment process, so they asked sounddelivery for help. We suggested giving some of the volunteers small cameras so they could capture what happens at camp and record short video-diaries about their experiences. This video is now being used by YHA at volunteering recruitment events and promoted online.

We’ve been working with the YHA since 2007 creating videos for their AGM which traditionally takes place in September. We’ve visited action-adventure summer camps (normally in the rain) and interviewed teachers and pupils about the benefits of going on school trips and staying in youth hostels.

This year we took a slightly different approach and trained young people (aged between 10 and 19) to do some of the work for us! Daubeney Primary School in Hackney volunteered to let us follow their Year 6 school trip to North Yorkshire. We trained the children to use audio recorders and digital cameras and they went away armed with microphones and made lots of recordings for us, and kept written diaries which we then able to record. The finished piece used loads of the pictures the kids took – and some of their recordings too!

We also trained teenagers to use small cameras so they could record video diaries while away at a YHA Do It 4 Real summer camp. We then spent a day filming at the camp (another rainy day!) and then put together the audio diaries and our footage in the edit. We got personal views of camp – and when reviewing the footage found lots of things we wouldn’t have been able to film ourselves. It gave the teenagers the chance to add their creativity too – I really like Katie’s spelling out Do It 4 Real on her condensated window!

We also had exclusive access to the first Families’ Activity Breaks run by the Ministry of Defence in partnership with the YHA. This pilot project was aimed at families who have suffered the loss of a serving parent (including step parent or other legal guardian). The camp involved loads of fun and exciting activities including coasteering, abseiling and raft building. sounddelivery Associate Lucy Frears spent a day at the camp in Coverack in Cornwall and interviewed mothers and children about their holiday and how they felt about spending a week with other families going through the bereavement process.

We were delighted that the audio we collected featured on Woman’s Hour on BBC Radio Four on Monday 17th August.

The presentation we put together, which you can see below, was played to a Government minister who was visiting the second week of the camp – which took place in Whitby. Discussions have taken place and we’re delighted that after this initial pilot 3 FAB camps are now taking place next summer.

YHA is in a competitive market and is constantly trying to keep its profile high so anyone choosing hostel accomodation will come to them. Young independent travellers have a host of options when it comes to cheap and affordable places to stay. We were asked to make a short film to appeal to young people to try and encourage them to choose YHA.

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“sounddelivery breathe life into ideas. YHA has worked on several projects with the company and has never been disappointed. They are a one-stop-shop for all of our multi-media requirements.” Sam Littlechilds, National Policy Officer, Marketing & Corporate Affairs Department, YHA

“Families Activity Breaks (FAB) is a tri Service initiative to provide bereaved Service families will an activity based holiday in partnership with the Youth Hostel Association and the Candle Project. sounddelivery produced a slideshow based on a day spent with the FAB mums, children and volunteers undertaking various adventure training activities including zip wires and rock climbing. The slide show captured the effect of the project and the emotions of the families in a way that was understated yet utterly powerful. I have been unable to adequately articulate the benefits and effect FAB has had on the families, I have put the slide show on and its done the job for me. We are now in a position to growing and expanding the project and I shall use the slide show to further support FAB.” Major Belinda Forsythe MBE

As part of our work this summer with YHA (Youth Hostel Association) we have recorded the stories of families taking part in a pilot project. Families’ Activity Breaks – also know as FAB camps – are activity holidays being run by the Ministry of Defence in partnership with the YHA. Families who have lost a loved one in military service have been spending their holidays together as part of this pilot project to support bereaved children and their remaining parent. Activities include building rafts, abseiling, rock climbing and flying down zip wires. The aim of the camps is to provide a safe and nurturing atmosphere for families to deal with their grief and meet with other families who have been through a similar experience. While recording the material we liaised with Woman’s Hour on Radio 4 who were very interested in the subject matter. We delivered edited interviews to them which they used to make an audio feature and they also invited guests for a studio discussion. You can hear part of the programme here:

This is a great example of getting coverage for a project by being proactive and building relationships with the media. We were in no doubt that the material collected would be compelling and of interest to journalists and made sure to make contacts early on and alert our BBC producer contact about the content.