YODO event at Angus College

YODO event at Angus College

Helen Dryden, Palliative Care Clinical Lead at Angus Community Health Partnership reflects on an event they held at Angus College, Arbroath, during Dying Matters Week 2014:

We already have some experience in holding community events about death, dying and bereavement, and this year we really wanted to try and engage with a younger age group.

We contacted the student engagement officer at Angus college and she discussed the best venue for our needs. On the 15th May we set up our stall. Three of us attended - two staff who work in palliative care and a local artist who helped organise and cut out templates for our 'tree'.

Our aim was to engage the students and staff to write a message to hang on the tree, and share what was important to them in the future.

We were positioned just outside the canteen and although it was exam week, a number of students and staff had a chat with us and took time to find out more and share their wishes. In all over 80 people came to speak and contribute to the tree of wishes. We really enjoyed the conversation, comments banter and laughs. A staff member who was just about to retire wanted to 'slide down the banister'!

We used the materials and resources available from the Good Life, Good Death, and Good Grief and Dying Matters websites plus templates of butterflies, birds and leaves to write messages on.

Wishes ranged from 'Catch a huge trout' to 'Write a book about my life'.

College staff are keen to add value and this event sparked off a request to come the following week and speak with social care students around the topic of coping with dying, being more open to discussions and the importance of 'thinking ahead'.

We hope to build on this event later on in the year as part of the To Absent Friends festival of storytelling and remembrance in November.'