We can help you bring generations together.
Our Empower programme supports housing associations and care homes across the UK to set up and deliver intergenerational projects that boost wellbeing and increase connections.
We’re looking for new housing associations and care homes to partner with to deliver impactful intergenerational activities.
Our Empower programme has connected more than 20 retirement schemes and schools across twelve counties, helping more than 500 older and younger neighbours access high quality intergenerational activities.
We’ve worked with several major housing associations including Clarion, Great Places and Housing 21. Could you be our next Empower partner?
How does it work?
-
Empower is our online platform and support offer for housing associations and care homes interested in offering intergenerational activities to their residents.
We understand that it can be difficult to get intergenerational projects off the ground, especially with busy diaries and competing priorities. We remove some of these barriers by matching housing associations and care homes with local schools and supporting project delivery from start to finish.
-
We work closely with staff at retirement schemes and care homes so they feel confident coordinating intergenerational activities. We provide assurance on topics such as risk and safeguarding and use our experience as facilitators to support teachers in leading regular intergenerational activities in communal lounges of schemes/care homes. We also provide the tools to easily schedule, deliver and report on the impact of intergenerational activities.
-
If you work at a housing association or a care home fill in our short form and we’ll be in touch.
If you’re a school, you can also contact us on this form. We can let you know if there are any schemes or care homes interested in pairing up.
If you're an individual or organisation looking to run your own intergenerational activities, why not check out our Activity Hub? It’s full of free tried and tested resources.
Why work with us?
We’ve been delivering intergenerational programmes since 2017, so we understand what’s needed to set up and deliver delightful, impactful and safe intergenerational projects.
As an Empower partner you can expect:
To be matched with a local school (usually no more than a 15 minute walk away), helping you deliver real community connections
Support from a dedicated InCommon team member, experienced in intergenerational delivery
Access to scheduling tools and calendar functions for easy coordination of the project
Impact and reporting tools that demonstrate resident attendance and engagement at intergenerational sessions
Access to promotional materials to engage residents
Support creating case studies to demonstrate the impact of intergenerational connections for residents and the wider community.
Housing LIN’s external evaluation
Housing LIN’s evaluation found that Empower improves health and wellbeing outcomes for older participants, including reduced loneliness and isolation, increased mental stimulation and increased sense of belonging to a community. These outcomes translate into cost savings to providers of retirement housing and also improve workplace satisfaction.
“The [Empower] platform’s usability, efficient onboarding and user autonomy make it an effective tool to support retirement housing managers and school leads to organise activities that are designed to help the generations connect, get to know each other and learn together... [Empower] presents an opportunity for private and social providers across a range of older persons housing, from retirement housing, villages, extra care and care homes, to enable residents to reap the powerful benefits of intergenerational connections.
”
You can hear more about Empower (and get a sneak peek of our platform) by watching Housing LIN’s HAPPI Hour.
MARTEN HOUSE, HOUSING 21
WISEWOOD COMMUNITY PRIMARY SCHOOL
Marten House and London Meed Primary are one of our longest running Empower projects. Based in West Sussex, they were connected in June 2022 as part of our pilot and have since met each term.
Click here to read more about the project and its impact.
Wisewood Community Primary School are partnered with Sutton Heights retirement scheme in Sheffield through Empower. They first met in November 2023.
Click here to read more about the partnership and its impact.
Contact us to get involved
Fill in our short form and we'll get back to you with more information.