Making a difference for refugees – meet the founder of the life-changing Plymouth programme START

Avril Bellinger says success of any size can come from simply asking ‘What can I do to help?’

Mrs Amy King

Media and Communications Officer

Corporate Communications (Marketing and Communications)

“What can I do to help?”

That’s the first thing that crossed Avril Bellinger’s mind at an International Women’s Day conference in 2001, when she heard from a local MP that Plymouth would soon be welcoming refugees.

As a Lecturer in Social Work at the University of Plymouth – she’s now an Honorary Associate Professor – she arranged for some of her students to work alongside the new arrivals for their placement.

And little did she know what it would become.

Modest beginnings

“It was very informal in the first instance,” she said. “I mentioned it to some students and we wanted to be the friendly faces that these refugees saw in a world where they had hardly had any help at all.”

Avril found out that the only financial support the City Council received was to help children into schools, meaning social and community support were left to each family to source themselves.

So she encouraged her students to work with the refugees as their placement:

“It seemed like a mutually beneficial project. But there was no official umbrella to run it under, so the charity Students and Refugees Together (START) was born. I remember we operated from a practice educator’s front room to begin with, and after 18 months with just one part-time member of staff – it was very small.”

Students completed their placements by working with refugee families, and their impact was notable.

For example, Mrs F, who spoke very little English, had complained consistently of stomach pain to the GP surgery, where some saw her as an 'attention-seeking nuisance'. The student’s perseverance in advocating for her right to translation provision resulted in an emergency examination and immediate admission to hospital for treatment of a neglected life-threatening infection.

Growing impact

Then in 2004, START received two large funding sources: a grant from the Big Lottery Fund and a contract to provide refugee housing support. These enabled them to take on more staff and fully empower the students and refugees within the service.

I was genuinely amazed – a small team of people were supporting refugees to settle in Plymouth and the far South West, while providing innovative placement opportunities for students.

Ms Avril Bellinger
Honorary Associate Professor in Social Work

While growing in size and impact, the one stipulation that has remained throughout the process is that students remain the majority of START’s workforce. The placements have expanded to occupational therapy as well as social work, and even extend to students from all over Europe.

Now in a voluntary role with START, Avril supports international students on placement at the charity with their professional development, and strongly believes in the educational power of global exchange.

“Education is an incredible thing that empowers and enriches lives. With START, we learn with, from and about each other for mutual benefit and it’s been amazing to watch the charity grow, as well as the brilliant students and service users who are part of it.”

In addition, as START has grown, so has Avril’s delivery of the ‘strengths approach’ – the idea that, however difficult your situation, there’s always something you can do with what you have, where you are.

She has co-written a book on the approach – 'The Strengths Approach in Practice' – with START Trustee and retired Social Work Lecturer, Deirdre Ford, and travelled worldwide to share the concepts within it.

Globally, she has maintained her long-standing relationship with Kulika Uganda, an in-country NGO that promotes social and environmental change through ecological organic agriculture, and become an elder in residence with the University of Glasgow UNESCO Chair in Refugee Integration through Languages and the Arts.

She is also a member of the International Federation of Social Workers, committed to a definition of social work that promotes social and environmental justice.

A feeling of home

Back at home, and to help with starting conversations within communities, START runs a Cultural Kitchen at Sherwell Church Hall twice a month.

Everyone is welcome, and students and service users prepare, serve and eat food together – with dishes from countries all over the world.

Medical graduate Olivia Collins undertook an intercalated placement with START during her degree:

The Cultural Kitchen is fantastic; dozens of people come along every fortnight and chat, play games, share stories and prepare food. I’d like to be a GP and I’m really interested in people. I’m also interested in the social determinants of health, as well as the importance of community and occupation for people’s wellbeing. This placement has been invaluable.

Olivia Collins

MSc Global Health

With all achievements and impact in mind, Avril was awarded an Honorary Fellowship by the University of Plymouth in February 2024.

She concluded:

“On one hand I can’t believe that a small idea has turned into a really successful charity that is still going so many years later, but on the other hand it’s such a simple idea that is mutually beneficial and could be used with other groups too. Refugees are only a burden if you make them one, and having this support in place has helped hundreds of people transform their lives – students and refugees alike.”

BA (Hons) Social Work

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