Recovery College news and events

Lightbulb Moments from the College for Mental Health Awareness 2022

With this year’s Mental Health Awareness Week focusing on loneliness, we challenged the team to remember some of their lightbulb moments - those points in time that make you stop and think; where maybe someone has said something that’s made an real impact, or you’ve seen someone else who’s struggling start to realise the benefit of sharing their thoughts and feelings with others.

Click here to find out more.

Working in partnership to define carers courses in Kingston

Kingston Adult Education have worked in partnership with SWLSTG Involvement and the Recovery College to deliver two taster sessions asking Carers to help identify topics that are most important to them.

There are 2 separate taster sessions this June, one online the other face to face to make sure they are as accessible as possible. Each session will cover:

• Understanding what happiness means to you

• Working with you to choose topics we should focus on

• Experience some techniques that will make you feel more refreshed and relaxed

• Build your resilience to help you bend to the pressures of life and not break

 Click here to find out more and for details on how to book.

Hospital Rooms is back at the Recovery College in 2022

The start of 2022 saw Hospital Rooms returning to the Recovery College to run a series of art sessions with a host of amazing artists. The flyer below gives you some idea just how diverse the sessions were. 

Missed out on our sessions?....For those who are really keen, Hospital Rooms themselves run a series of digital art session which you can book via their website here. Or, if you'd rather take part in an in-person session, there are workshops being held at the Courtauld Gallery in London. To find out more and see how to book visit their website. 

Summer School 2021 - what a success!

Once again the Recovery College teamed up with Hospital Rooms to produce a Summer School consisting of five days of art workshops, hosted by professional artists and creative groups.  These sessions were completely free and available to anyone , whether you're registered with the Recovery College or not. We now have some amazing art for our walls, students buzzing about new art techniques and ideas they've tried, and we hope to be working with the team again in the New Year.  Click here for a short showreel of the week and what our students had to say.

In May 2018 the college hosted an evening seminar on youth violence

To mark Mental Health Awareness week the College approached the Charity BLAM (black learning achievement and mental health) to run an evening seminar on the impact of youth violence.  The session was open to all, with panellists ranging from a SEN Children specialist, to a Youth Offending Team Worker and a Social Activist.

The aim of the event was to exchange ideas in tackling the trauma associated with youth violence - what support exists now and new ways to potentially approach the issue.  

Recovery College Welcomed International Visitor to Kick Start 2018

2018 was a busy year for the Recovery College, with two international visits coordinated by IMROC (Implementing Recovery through Organisational Change) looking at best practice in the UK.

January kicked off with a visit from a study group from Bulgaria, looking at best practice to set up their own Recovery College. All attendees were members of GIP-SOFIA (Global Initiative on Psychiatry). With a truly diverse group including clinical directors, peer support workers, autism association members and learning disability specialists, it was a busy day with a lot of discussion. Thankfully, having a native Bulgarian speaker on our team of trainers made a huge difference in spanning the language barrier.

“I would like to thank you for the warm welcome, the opportunity to ask all our questions and the exceptional surprise to answer us in pure Bulgarian.

 I hope that with what we have learned we will be able to "translate" the model to the Bulgarian context, and next time we will expect you and your colleagues in Bulgaria so that we can share.”

Valentina Hristakeva, Director, Global Initiative on Psychiatry-Sofia (17^th Jan, 2018)

In February we hosted a team of Psychiatrists, Researchers, Social Workers and Academics from Japan. Coordinated by IMROC, the team were here as part of a week-long UK tour of Recovery Colleges, Early Intervention groups and vocational and community services.

The group’s aim was to learn about the stages for preparation and set up of a recovery college, understanding how it sits within the infrastructure of a wider recovery-orientated organisation. This included exploring the core operational structures and policies for running a college, and participating in college courses as a student

The morning was spent covering how the Recovery College works with focus on our core principles of coproduction, self-directed learning, belief in our students and a coaching educational style This continued with a question and answer session to help our guests problem solve the issues they are experiencing. The afternoon consisted of our guests experiencing a taster session of our Coping with Stress course.

Judging by their comments we think the day went well:

“We would like to thank you for your warm welcome and very kind hospitality extended to us. We are very impressed by your innovative ways to value one's lived experience and seek to ingrain co-production into the mental health services.

 We have learned the heart of recovery college and have been encouraged to set up more recovery colleges in Japan. We really appreciate all you have done for us.”

Recovery College Study Tour Team from Japan (19th Feb, 2018)

Register as a student

Enrolling for a course at South West London Recovery College is easy.

Online registration form

If you would like a form sent to you, or you’d prefer to chat to someone face to face simply call us or come along to the college and we can take you through the registration process.

Once we have your registration details we will be in touch to confirm your place/s by email (where an address has been supplied) and post.

We recommend you attend one of our regular Open Days, where you can talk to your local college trainers who can recommend and signpost courses that best meet your needs. These take place at the start and end of most of our terms, so take a look at the timetables page to find out when the next ones are scheduled.

If you have any queries please Email or call us on: 020 3513 5818

Eligibility

Courses are available for people in the following groups:

• Anyone currently using our services (there are some exceptions so please contact us to check first)

• Anyone discharged from our services in the past 12 months (as above)

• Supporters (family, friends or carers) of people who use our services or people who have been discharged from SWLSTG services within the past 12 months

• Our staff (some restrictions apply – please check the course timetable  for details)

What we do

Your recovery is at the heart of all our plans.

We use a recovery-based approach to encourage people to become experts in their own self-care and wellbeing. Our courses give students the tools to make informed choices, become experts in their own recovery, and to help them do the things they want to in life.

 We have a library and computers to use at our base at Springfield Hospital and we welcome students to use this area to study.

You can do as little or as much as you like at the College, but generally, the more you put in, the more you get out, but you don't have to take our word for it.  Here's a letter from one of our previous students, detailing where life has taken him since leaving the college. 

We love hearing from our students as they take the next step in their recovery journey.  Going Forward is a piece written by a student who's attended classes between 2019 and 2022, sent with thanks to the team for the support the college provided as she learnt skills to help her to look after herself and stay well.