2019 Shortlist | The Unicorn Centre (Riding for the Disabled Association)
The Unicorn Centre (Riding for the Disabled Association)
Shortlist – Embracing Opportunity and Harnessing Risk
Who they are
The Unicorn Centre is a volunteer-led charity operating a purpose-built horse riding centre for disabled people. It is a member group of the Riding for the Disabled Association (RDA), and has provided riding, therapy and competitions for disabled children and adults for the past 21 years. Its remit also embraces training and education, mental health support and volunteering employability.
Currently with 200 weekly participants and a waiting list of 68, the centre’s staff and volunteers aim to enable their participants to achieve beyond society-led expectations by creating improved physical mobility, interaction with the community or supporting sporting achievement on a national or local scale. They see challenges not problems which require ingenuity, flexibility of thought and great communications skills to increase a participant’s self-worth to enable them to meet life’s challenges head on.
What they’ve achieved
The Unicorn Centre is located in a deprived area experiencing dwindling support for disabled people, leaving adults with disabilities who wish to be involved and useful within their community few options for pursuing their goals after they complete their education. The Unicorn Centre board had to find new ways of funding its programmes to ensure that its beneficiaries did not lose further services. In April 2013, the North of England was used as a trial area for Personal Independent Payments (PIP), and the trustees seized their opportunity, realising that PIP could be leveraged to fund a new Supported Volunteer Programme (a priority for staff and participants alike). The programme now supports 16 volunteers and four staff, and is financially self-sustaining and operating in line with the centre’s charitable mission and vision. The programme has also helped The Unicorn Centre strengthen relationships with stakeholders, improve its impact on the community, and develop a new approach to managing risk within the organisation.
Why they were shortlisted
Judges were impressed by the Board’s ability to recognise the opportunity that the Personal Independent Payments (PIP) programme presented in providing funding for a Supported Volunteer Programme that The Unicorn Centre otherwise would not have been able to implement. Trustees also took appropriate measures to minimize risk: researching and working with partners to understand PIP, setting clear goals for what they wanted the programme to achieve and imposing parameters for the scope of the project, developing effective monitoring tools, updating their safeguarding policy and training programmes. The process trustees designed to successfully implement and oversee the Supported Volunteers Programme has had a bigger impact on the charity, as it has become a tool that trustees use when developing other new programmes, such as The Unicorn Centre’s new Hippotherapy service.
