Nathan Singleton

Chief Executive Officer
Nathan is passionate about improving the lives of young people and their families. Nathan draws from the African proverb, “It takes a village to raise a child.” He believes community is the component that is missing in the modern western society and the key component that would benefit young people. Nathan believes we are there, not just to help others but to support them to become agents of change within their communities.
Articles

How do you keep healthy?

Here at Healthwatch Barking and Dagenham, we are currently undertaking a project to understand the needs of local people when it comes to maintaining a healthy lifestyle.We're aware that so much of our lives have been disrupted by the COVID pandemic these past two years and that it has changed the way we think, the way we feel, and what...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

SW!TCH Lives: Stop and search training with the Metropolitan Police

Stop and search is a popular crime monitoring tool utilised by the Metropolitan Police. It's viewed as one of the best ways to tackle crime and keep our streets safe. The police have the right to stop and search anyone, no matter how old they are. Should that person be quite young, there is no obligation to carry out the...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

Do they know it’s Christmas?

But say a prayer, pray for the other ones. —'Do They Know It's Christmas?', Band Aid (1984) A little over six months ago, I was reflecting on the unpredictable period of events we were going through–the food shortages, lockdowns, demonstrations and the forced isolation from our communities. Building on this, I wrote an article to mark Loneliness Week, which highlighted...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

SW!TCH Rights: Finding out how stop and search affects young people

I read recently in a Metropolitan Police report that London youth crime figures have decreased by 50% over the last five years but, in the last year alone, the use of stop and search in England and Wales had risen by 24%. The Metropolitan Police made almost half (49%) of all stop and searches in England and Wales and the...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

What does community mean to you?

The greatness of a community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its members. Coretta Scott King Ibn Khaldun, the Arab philosopher, popularised the concept of asabiyyah عصبيّة‎. The idea that a community has a sense of shared purpose that link members of different social groups to one another.Mpu Tantular, the 14th century Javanese poet, coined the term...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

Safeguarding: “If you trust me to tell me…”

Here at LifeLine, when we're working with young people, you'll often hear us say,"If you trust me to tell me, you need to trust me to do the right thing with what you tell me."And that means, even if it's not immediately obvious, we're doing what we believe is in their best interest.A lot of what we do to help...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

Compassion will unite us all

On 7th May 2020 the city of Richmond, Virginia, USA joined the International Charter for Compassion, a global movement guided by the Golden Rule of treating others as you wish others to treat you. Richmond wants compassion to be at the core of its community. What if every organisation put compassion at the core of their business culture?

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

Have we forgotten how to play?

Just recently, I was speaking with a close friend of mine on what it was like to finally be able to interact with each other face-to-face again. The conversation turned to how our children were coping, and he began to tell me of a recent event – his son had his friends come over to the house to play together,...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

Building better physical health for young people in Barking and Dagenham

There have been growing concerns in recent years over a rise in a sedentary lifestyles among young people–much has been said of the rise of technology such as social media playing a role. And we can see this starkly at a local level: even before the pandemic, research has shown that Barking and Dagenham has had one of the lowest...

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

Supporting young people with complex needs

We spoke with Kiera, one of our SW!TCH Youth Development Workers, about the ongoing support she's been delivering to Rose, a young person dealing with multiple and complex needs who had been admitted to a local mental health unit.

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

Articles

SW!TCH Minds: Helping young people become Agents for Change

Part of our wider SW!TCH initiative, SW!TCH Minds works to improve the mental health of young people through a carefully-designed programme built around weekly one-to-one mentoring sessions supported by a range of extra-curricular positive activities and opportunities to engage with the local community.

5 years ago

 by Nathan Singleton

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