Community Story: Carefree Cornwall

Cornwall is the latest destination for our latest feature on an awardee of a grant from the Community Matters Fund (Future Skills) 2026 from National Grid, where Luke Upton speaks to Karen Stephens of Carefree Cornwall, a fantastic organisation helping young people about the importance of partnerships, developing opportunities, closing gaps and much more.

Luke Upton (LU): Thanks for the time today, could you give us a little introduction into the origins and development of Carefree Cornwall offers to your community?

Karen Stephens (KS): Carefree Cornwall is a charity founded 21 years ago with the overall aim of helping care experienced young people to have a good life. We offer young people in the care of Cornwall Council support with positive relationships, transitions, and improving the care system for themselves and others. In the 20 years since it was founded, Carefree has developed into an award-winning organisation which is in touch with over 1,000 care experienced young people between the ages of 11-25 each year and offers an annual direct service to around 600.

As well as regular groups and residential programmes focussing on developing self-confidence, friendships, creative expression and sporting interests, we have a particular focus on helping care leavers to access employment and achieve economic wellbeing through careers support and guidance, work tasters, coaching and employability skills. Care leavers are at significantly higher risk of being unemployed and benefit dependent as they move into adulthood, but with Carefree’s support, Cornwall’s figures for care leavers in employment exceed the national average by 10 – 20%.

LU: Great, and what have been some of your recent priorities and focus?

KS: Our Careers Information Advice and Guidance keyworkers provide training, work experience and employment opportunities for 16 – 25-year-olds who are not in education, employment and training. They do this through one-to-one support and group work where young people can develop social skills, build self-confidence, learn to work as a team, experience the world of work, meet employers, gain qualifications, and develop their employability skills.

Working in partnership with local employers and organisations is central to this work, and the team have developed strong working relationships with various hospitality, construction, care, retail, and other industries which offer bespoke site visits, work tasters and experience of the workplace. Recent highlights include visits to the Cornwall Air Ambulance, a granite quarry, the RSPCA, and a major construction site, as well as work experience with the Cornwall Hospitality Collective, CV and mock interview workshops with HR professionals, teambuilding activities with injured military veterans, and preparation classes for the driving theory test.

LU: You’ve just received funding from the Community Matters Fund (Future Skills) 2026 from National Grid and Localgiving. Can you tell us some more about the project, what it will help fund and what it aims to deliver.

KS: We are extremely grateful to have received funding from the Community Matters Fund, which will enable us to provide more direct support to care leavers over the age of 16 who are not in, or who are at risk of not being in, education, employment or training. Many thanks to all at National Grid and Localgiving for their support.

Specifically, the project, it will fund a care experienced professional job coach to provide one-to-one support for 40 care leavers, giving them the opportunity to experience the world of work, increase their understanding of employers’ expectations, develop their social skills, practise their interview skills, attend workshops, develop their CVs, and decrease the barriers to employment. It will also fund our Accreditation Officer to support 20 to 25 care leavers to achieve one or more AQA accreditations in Employability Skills, Working as Part of a Team, and Finding Work.

LU: How important is this kind of grant funding to your organisation?

KS: This kind of grant funding is essential to our organisation and the young people we support. Young people leaving care can experience social isolation and difficulties building positive relationships. Without the support of a family base to prepare them to make friends and succeed in wider society, young people in care are 5 times less likely to achieve average GCSE results, and 3 times more likely to be unemployed at 19. Isolation and low self-esteem can make young people vulnerable to further abuse, including unhealthy relationships and exploitation. The Nuffield Foundation’s 2021 Report found that ‘the chances of cared-for children enjoying the same social and economic advantages in adulthood as other children are deeply unequal’.

The type of grant funding offered by the Community Matters Fund from National Grid enables Carefree to work towards closing the gap between care experienced young people and their non-care experienced peers, thereby levelling the playing field and providing opportunities which might otherwise be inaccessible. Thank you again for the support.

LU: As we always like to ask our community members, more money aside, what would help you most?

KS: The partnerships we have developed with local and national employers to date have created positive opportunities for care leavers by offering work tasters, experience in the workplace, site visits and guaranteed interviews. We would welcome support from more local employers, particularly those in key Cornish industries such as hospitality, farming, construction, and leisure, which would further enhance our impact and give care leavers more understanding of, and greater access to, a wider range of local opportunities.

By signing up to the Care Leavers’ Covenant and offering guaranteed interviews to care experienced applicants, local companies can actively support our work and make a positive difference for young people leaving care and navigating the world of work. We would love to partner with more local businesses who can offer work taster days to show that despite adverse childhood experiences, work can be a positive and achievable destination. If your business would like to help us to level the playing field and support our mission to give care experienced young people a good life, we would love to hear from you!

LU: Great, thanks Karen, we’ll be sure to keep our readers up to date with your developments.

Find out more about the Carefree Cornwall here. 

For the latest on the Community Matters Fund click here. 

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