The Active Calderdale VCSE Charter
Active Calderdale believes every organisation can play their part in supporting and encouraging those who visit their organisation to move more. Working in partnership with local organisation Voluntary & Community (VAC), Active Calderdale asked the Voluntary, Community and Social Enterprise (VCSE) Sector to pledge their support in helping Calderdale to move more.
The Active Calderdale VCSE Charter has been piloted with several local organisations who have made the commitment to:
- Making moving more desirable
- Lead the way for moving more
- Providing people with the skills and knowledge to move more
- Support staff and volunteers to move more
- Support members/service users to move more
- Understand and monitor the changes being implemented and the impact these changes are having
- Celebrate successes
Charter organisations each received support to create a tailored action plan and a small grant to help them implement positive changes and get their team and service users moving more.
Making Space Carers Wellbeing Service
Making Space Carers Wellbeing Service Calderdale signed up to the Active Calderdale VCSE Charter in late 2022. Since then, the organisation has made amazing progress in embedding a moving more culture to benefit their team.

In November last year, we became Charter members of Active Calderdale and since then we have begun implementing changes within our office setting and in how we promote and encourage carers to be more active.
We have appointed an Active Calderdale champion and they have been busy coming up with ideas to motivate both staff and carers. Having a named lead on this has really helped us keep the momentum going for this project.
Staff are encouraged to take the stairs, have regular movement breaks, have a short walk at lunchtime and have also been encouraged to eat healthier at work. These changes have helped one member of staff lose over 2 stone since we brought in these changes.
Lydia Woodhall - Team Leader at Making Space

Signing up to the Active Calderdale VCSE Charter has also encouraged the organisation to create its own team challenges, launching a staff steps challenge for the whole month of January 2023.
Each week the staff member that had done the most steps received a basket of fruit. We took some valuable learning from the challenge and realised that rather than rewarding the total number of steps, it was more motivating to reward staff for completing the log and reward for most improvement rather than focusing on the actual number. This learning will help us when planning how we deliver this challenge to carers in the future.
Lydia Woodhall - Team Leader at Making Space
Within the office, the staff have also been taking part in office exercise such as chair squats and gentle stretching and a steps machine has now been installed in their staff area.
Being an Active Calderdale VCSE Charter organisation has also benefited the Making Space services users, with the organisation offering a monthly exercise based activity. Carers are enjoying the sessions and proudly wear their Active Calderdale t-shirts.
The Making Space Carers Wellbeing Service Calderdale team have fully supported the new changes:
Being a part of Active Calderdale has provided our team with the opportunity to come together as a team in a fun and active way which has benefited us all. We are all more active and eating better as a result!
Louise - Active Calderdale Champion
Active Calderdale has been a great boost for our mental health and the steps challenge has encouraged me to get more fresh air and strive to win the weekly prize!
Aisha - Locality Team
Making Plans
Future plans include continuing to offer a physical activity each month and, as part of a new project for carers 75+, set up new social groups to include an offer of support around physical health. Making Space Carers Wellbeing Service Calderdale also plan to link in with national awareness campaign Carers UK Active April including an Easter themed sponsored walk and launching a step into spring walking challenge for carers.
The grant received from Active Calderdale will be used to purchase pedometers for carers taking part in walking challenges and after completing the challenge, they can keep them to carry on tracking their activity day to day.
For more information about the Active Calderdale VCSE Charter, please visit https://www.cvac.org.uk/active-calderdale/
For more information about Making Space Carers Wellbeing Service Calderdale, please visit https://makingspace.co.uk/carers-wellbeing-service-calderdale