DISC News Items - Updated 02/11/09

25th Anniversary...

Northern regional social inclusion charity Developing Initiatives Supporting Communities (DISC) celebrates its 25th anniversary this year 2009.

DISC specialises in developing innovative partnerships with the public and private sector to enable people whose lives are in crisis due to poor housing, substance misuse, family breakdown and low skills to make changes they once thought were impossible, and achieve their potential regardless of their circumstances.

When DISC started in 1984 it was a small training and job search initiative for unemployed young people and ex-offenders in Durham City.

Now it’s one of the North East’s biggest home-grown voluntary organisations with a £12m turnover and programmes tackling deprivation across the North East, Yorkshire and Lancashire. Around 380 staff and 130 volunteers work with 7,000 service users a year.

DISC chief executive Steve Johnson said: “We’ve grown but stayed true to our principles. We still go out to meet people where and when they feel comfortable. We talk to them about what they want to achieve and what’s holding them back. We find flexible and holistic ways of supporting and enabling them to progress, establish jobs, homes and stable relationships, and contribute to their communities.”

DISC has been praised for its partnership work with smaller local charities. It won the public sector organisation of the year category in the 2008 Durham and Wearside Business Awards and was a finalist in the 2008 North East Business Awards. It was highly commended in both the Research, Advice and Support and the Effectiveness categories of the prestigious national Charity Awards www.charityawards.co.uk 2009.

Updated 02/11/09