The South North Journey: A Celebration of Younger Folks’s Resilience

That is the story of 4 males in a ship and a tandem rickshaw…after which one other boat! Of an iconic, world first problem…on house soil.

Overlook Land’s Finish to John O’Groats! The southernmost level of the British Isles is definitely the islands of Les Minquiers, south of Jersey, simply off the French coast, whereas the northernmost level is Out Stack, a rocky outpost off the northern tip of Shetland. A journey of round 1200 miles.

One in every of us (Kevin), psychologist and bestselling writer, realized again in 2021 that not solely had no-one undertaken this journey, however no-one had even considered it. Intrigued, he set about persuading a trio of like-minded individuals to affix him on this epic quest. Billy Taylor, an skilled ocean rower, jumped in and agreed to skipper the rowing sections. An ex-paramedic and fireman, Billy has developed a ardour for ocean rowing and has now crossed lots of the world’s oceans underneath his personal steam.

They are going to be joined within the journey by Patrick Neale, who, together with his associate, Polly, runs, Jaffe & Neale, an unbiased bookshop in Chipping Norton. Having lately stopped enjoying rugby within the native membership, Patrick jumped on the probability to affix Kevin and the boys on the South North Journey, particularly as he’s enthusiastic about encouraging kids and younb individuals to learn.

The ultimate member of the workforce is Gary Hutchings. Gary hails from north Devon, the place he runs his personal enterprise, and can be a extremely completed ocean rower and adventurer.

Kevin lastly managed to influence his spouse, Elaine, additionally a psychologist and psychological well being researcher, to assist manage this epic journey – his best accomplishment of all! We’re each enthusiastic about making this journey a pageant of younger individuals’s resilience and psychological well being and goal to develop a novel analysis challenge based mostly on what younger individuals, themselves, need to say. It’s all about listening to their goals, their concepts, their targets. We wish to deliver the lived expertise of the nation’s youth into the guts of the analysis course of and couldn’t consider a greater associate than MQ – The Psychological Well being Analysis Charity to deliver this to fruition. Extra on that later.

The workforce will begin by rowing about 300 miles from Les Minquiers to Portsmouth, through Jersey, after which from Scrabster, within the north of Scotland, to Out Stack. Within the interim, they may cycle round 900 miles on land on their custom-made tandem rickshaw from Portsmouth Harbour to Scrabster.

We reached out to 10 fantastic charity companions (you possibly can view them right here) who agreed to work with the workforce. The thought is that Kevin and the boys will chat to younger individuals at our 10 charity ‘meet and greets’ all through the nation to debate what they suppose psychological well being researchers must be investigating. We are going to then put together a analysis proposal after the journey and goal to pursue these questions in a scientifically legitimate research. We hope that the nation will get behind the workforce on this epic journey and celebration of younger individuals’s resilience.

All of our charity companions are concerned with supporting younger individuals in a method or one other. In Jersey, the workforce will meet individuals from Each Youngster Our Future who this 12 months are highlighting the significance of studying books and tales for psychological well being and creating resilience. On an identical theme, the 1851 Belief whom they may meet in Portsmouth emphasize the position of schooling and significant pondering expertise in giving younger individuals a step up in life. Then it’s off to London on the tandem-rickshaw the place they may converse with younger individuals from Girls in Sport concerning the position of sport and bodily exercise in constructing confidence and resilience in younger ladies; the Huge Child Basis can be ready in Brixton to debate the influence of knife crime amongst younger individuals and the way we’d be capable to cut back it. Their patron, chef Michel Roux, will current the workforce with a frozen boeuf bourguignon to be consumed once they full the journey. From Brixton, it’s off to Oxford, accompanied a part of the best way by Susie Dent, patron of Information Canine, who will cycle alongside the workforce and introduce them to younger visually impaired individuals the place they may talk about methods they take care of any such adversity. It’s then on to Sheffield the place the workforce plan to reach in the course of the World Snooker Championship the place a number of main gamers will introduce them to their chosen charity Jessie Could, who’re supporting finish of life take care of younger individuals dealing with terminal sickness. Kevin will interview younger individuals and their households about how they address this worst of adversities. The workforce will then head to the small Yorkshire village of Bramhope the place they’ve been promised a cream tea by the triathete Brownlee brothers and a go to to the Brownlee Basis who’re additionally utilizing bodily exercise and sport to construct resilience in younger individuals. Alongside the best way, the workforce can be accompanied by Bikeability and Heavy Metallic Truants who give attention to biking and bodily exercise to spice up wellbeing.

In all conferences, alongside the size of the nation Kevin and the workforce will hearken to kids and younger individuals and ask them what they imagine must be the main target of psychological well being analysis to construct their resilience and shield towards the onset of psychological well being issues. We are able to’t wait to listen to their concepts, and which of them could be changed into a sound analysis challenge. The workforce will then converse with some main researchers and youth ambassadors from MQ of their closing ‘meet and greet’ in Edinburgh. They are going to talk about these concepts and take into account how we’d go about establishing a co-produced analysis challenge based mostly on all of those interviews and discussions – a very novel manner of bringing the lived expertise of youngsters to the guts of the analysis course of. This is without doubt one of the the explanation why MQ is without doubt one of the trusted companions of the south north workforce.