HIVE (Hope, Inspiration and Vision in Education) is Kilmarnock College’s dedicated centre for young people who are unsuited to school but not yet ready for vocational courses.  One of the members of staff in the centre was approached by Musical Minds who were looking for students who knew sign language. Musical Minds wanted volunteers to learn a song in sign language and perform it with a local choir of singers who suffer from dementia (Musical Minds are supported by Alzheimer’s Scotland).

On Wednesday afternoons the students went along to Musical Minds to learn the songs and sing with the group.  Callum, who is deaf, and his friend David could already use sign language and they helped the girls in the team to learn how to sign.  They were all a bit unsure at first but received lots of encouragement from the staff at HIVE and at Musical Minds.

“We were nervous of working with older people and not knowing anything about dementia made us nervous but the group were great and we are really enjoying it.  We are learning new signs and getting better at the signs we already knew.  We have all agreed that as we learn sign language we are also learning to work as a group, and our confidence is growing.  As well as learning lots and becoming more confident we think we have become responsible citizens and effective contributors - staff tell us that we have had a major impact on the group and we all think it would be good to continue working with this group even after we finish college.”

The group has just performed in front of a large audience at the Palace Theatre at this year’s Provost’s Charity Concert in aid of Alzheimer Scotland.  Kilmarnock College, Musical Minds, Alzheimer Scotland and local dementia sufferers have all benefited from the students involvement and the students themselves said “Lots of people in Kilmarnock might not know about the kind of things students at the College could get involved in.  Because we are students from the College this helps people see that the College and us as young people like to do things to help other people.   A lot of the people in the group are quite old and need quite a lot of attention.  We think it’s really good for older people and younger people to learn about each other and work together.  Now we think that other local community groups will contact us and ask us if we could volunteer with them to help do different things that they wouldn’t normally be able to do without extra help.”

Group members were also concerned about the negative images that are promoted by the mass media and want people to know what they think.  “There is a television programme at the moment which doesn’t give a very good impression of some young people in Kilmarnock.  Hopefully this will help to change people’s minds that we are not all like that.”

Team members: Courtni Chapman, David Stewart, Amanda King, Jennifer Gibson, Callum Brown and Kimberley Rafferty.