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Gloucestershire Short Breaks
Published
Short breaks provide disabled children and young people with an opportunity to spend time away from their parents or primary carers, relaxing, having fun with their friends, experiencing the same range of activities and environments as non-disabled children and young people. Short breaks also provide parents and carers with a "break" from their caring responsibilities, giving them a chance to rest, spend time with partners and other children.
Here Barnwood Trust and Active Impact detail opportunities for 2025 and beyond.
For information on eligibility and more, please visit the Short Breaks page on the SEND Local Offer and for recent updates, please read the new information from Barnwood Trust and Active Impact.
Barnwood Trust, Gloucestershire County Council and Gloucestershire VCSE Alliance have awarded four organisations two years of funding through a partnership to enhance Short Breaks provision in Gloucester, Tewkesbury, and North Cotswolds.
In addition, Barnwood Trust is pleased to announce an extension of funding until April 2027 for the six organisations that participated in the original Short Breaks Fund.
Gloucestershire Short Breaks Partnership Project Funding - Barnwood Trust
The Gloucestershire Short Breaks Programme is taking a “test and learn” approach, aiming to improve access to high-quality, inclusive short breaks for families of disabled children and young people across Gloucestershire, while also informing how services will be commissioned going forward.
After a thorough review process by Barnwood Circle members and other Experts by Lived Experience, four organisations have been awarded funding. These are:
In addition to these four new funding awards, Barnwood Trust is pleased to announce an extension of funding until April 2027 for the six projects funded in the first year of the Short Breaks Fund.
These organisations are:
· ND Hub (formerly ADHD Hub)
Together, these providers have already demonstrated a strong commitment to delivering high-quality, inclusive services across Gloucestershire. The Gloucestershire Short Breaks programme looks forward to continuing to work with them as they build on their learnings and success.
In addition to these funding awards, Barnwood Trust is pleased to announce the appointment of Collaborate CIC as the evaluation partner for the duration of this programme, following a competitive tendering process.
Collaborate CIC brings a wealth of experience in evaluation, commissioning, and public sector reform. Their insights will be key to achieving the partners’ collective vision to redesign the way Short Breaks activities are commissioned across Gloucestershire, ensuring services continue to evolve based on lived experiences and real impact.
Since its launch in 2023, the Short Breaks programme has focused on increasing access to high-quality services, informed by the experiences of disabled children and young people, their families, and local providers. In its first year, the fund supported over 600 disabled children and young people across the county, nearly three-quarters of whom attended Short Breaks activities for the first time.
With this extension of funding and allocation of new funding, these efforts will expand further—particularly in Tewkesbury and North Cotswolds—while offering more inclusive and supportive options for families across Gloucestershire.
Visit Barnwood Trust’s Short Breaks page for more information about the programme and the partnership.
The Guide to Short Breaks - Gloucestershire is a publication bought together by the team at Active Impact (www.activeimpact.org.uk). It seeks to help parent carers find activities that work for their child – helping children with additional needs to get involved in their local communities and have fun alongside their friends. Short Breaks also help parents have ‘time off’ from their caring responsibilities.
Active Impact is a Gloucestershire charity that works to increase and improve inclusion for disabled children. Over the past 15 years they have worked tirelessly to develop inclusive ‘Short Breaks’ opportunities for disabled and non-disabled children and young people to do together. A Short Break is any activity or opportunity that allows a child with additional needs to spend time away from their parents or carers (or work towards this), grow in confidence and autonomy, and enjoy their childhood in the same way as any other child. Short Breaks can be transformative for children who are often isolated or excluded from the world around them.
Short Breaks are also intended to help parent carers have time to themselves, rest, and do the things they might otherwise find it hard to do whilst caring for their child. Active Impact passionately believes that all children have the right to enjoy their childhood, and all families should have what they need to find a good balance of work, rest, and enjoyment. Some families benefit from support from the Local Authority to identify and secure a suitable place for their child to attend. Other families could, with a few reasonable adjustments, use settings in their local neighbourhood such as Scouts or a drama club. Short breaks activities can be as unique as the children who attend! Active Impact plays a significant role in the county in supporting activity providers to understand more about what families with disabled children need, how to make reasonable adjustments, and support them to grow what they can do and who they reach.
The Guide to Short Breaks - Gloucestershire is a way to access a lot of Short Breaks information in one place – a crash course if you like, in how to find something for your child. It isn’t exhaustive, so if you think there’s something missing from the guide, please do get in touch with the team at Active Impact and they’ll look to add it in! The Guide is refreshed annually and kept up to date. Please contact us for a physical copy.
If you have any questions or comments on the guide, please contact Active Impact at info@activeimpact.org.uk.