If you grew up poor, what minor/low level thing would have helped you?

[flowersintheatticus]

Obviously the solution is money, which isn't really an option. I'm involved in a very small scale community 'levelling up' project to help dc who are in the lowest socio-economic bracket. What practical/human resource might have helped you? The families already have access to food bank/heating vouchers, so it's more aimed at the children and their development, education and wellbeing. Any suggestions welcome.

Mentoring. I wanted to progress but had no family members who had been to Uni or who were worling in professional.roles. Access to mentoring can really help with this

Books

A youth club;

The local church by me holds a youth club weekly for primary aged children and another for secondary school age. It's a huge church and they most get a huge amount of generous donations as I've never seen a modern church that big that also offers so much for the local community for free. They have 4 big rooms, toys and games for the kids to play with, ping-pong, a room for ball games. Free squash and biscuits each. Parents wait in a separate area where free tea & coffee is available.

The teen day they have consoles to play, a room to sit and chill with music, again the ball game room for basketball/football.

They also do a free cinema show once a month for children showing a popular children's film that was released in the last year.

Free sports club:

That doesnt make football the main focus. Being able to have the opportunity to try different sports; badminton, netball, basketball, gymnastics, trampoline.

People really underestimate how play and socialisng is so important to all children and even more so for those deprived. Some children may live in overcrowded homes, not have the space to play, not have the opportunity to access safe play areas.
They end to be able to play/mess around, be loud and move, without a parent constantly telling them to be quiet or stop

career and education advice.

Having a place where someone can come and talk about their profession, what qualifications are needed and the average salary in their sector.
It's not done enough in schools. All jobs, scientists, engineers, plumbers, cybersecurity, local businesses in the area to talk about what different jobs are available and what they look for in their employees

Me too.

After school clubs, like homework club. I used to go to a Latin club because the teacher bought food, and it was better than going home to a cold empty house. (I got a A* in my GCSE Latin just from those free after school lessons so that was a bonus).

I second the warm winter coat. I had one from a charity shop that was bright orange and ripped down the side, it wasn't really waterproof and I got bullied because I looked like a traffic cone....

Definitely coat and shoes that fit. I spent many winters as a child without a coat.

The chance to do something “extra” like other kids. Like football or dance or music or cricket or whatever.

Shoes that i wasnt going to get laughed at wearing

A bit more knowledge about personal hygiene and cleanliness - we grew up in a house without a shower and baths were a once weekly affair, hair washed in the bath. I had no idea really until some girls at school made fun of my greasy hair that my norm wasn’t the norm.

Opportunities to do things we weren’t able to access at home. Many things, although it wasn’t often outright said, weren’t really for people like us. My parents were quite good at doing the odd cultural thing with us when they had the cash but trips to even local galleries and things like camping were seen as very middle class and really not for us.

Proper school uniform, not the nearly right things my mum bought, which everyone knew were not really uniform and the class got points deducted for not correct uniform. Those were the days.😒

A proper bedroom.. My childhood bedroom was a bare mattress, a dirty quilt, bare floorboards and no curtains.
A rug, duvet set and something on the windows would have meant everything to me. As I got older, sanitary towels, deodorant, fashionable clothing and someone to step in and take me to the dentist for braces and then encouragement to do something other than get a full time crappy job.

@lostonadustyrock I wash my hair in the bath- are we not meant to ? It seems fine

I didn't even get a weekly bath, just, once in a while, and then as I got old enough for them to give me baths, I did it even less. I had to learn all this as an older teen and adult, taking care of myself

I used to look at the other girls hair, and wonder why my own was so horrible and thiers got to all be so nice. I couldn't understand it was just greasy

1. A decent hair cut, rather than the kitchen scissors..!
2. Clubs - I was never allowed to join anything extra after school. I desperately wanted to join the Army Cadets.
3. An item of clothing that was branded. I didn’t own a branded anything until well into adulthood. I still struggle to spend on clothes.

Someone upthread mentioned career support / mentoring and this would have been so helpful for me. My family / parents' circle of friends had jobs like hairdresser, shop assistant, taxi driver so I didn't get much guidance or advice about potential careers. (Or things like applying for university).

Also clothes that weren't hand me downs!

Being heard and having feelings validated.
I used to train a Community Development course for mums (started off for young mums but gradually became any age)
So many said that being heard was the biggest thing the course had done for them.

We were very poor but lived in London and had access to lots of (at that time) free museums. They were really instrumental in me developing a love of learning, which ended up with me being able to go to a really good university, first in my family to go to one.

Waterproofs, as said by others.

And proper comfortable school shoes.

To be able to so extra curriculum classes everything is so expensive and I really would like to take my cjildr3n to clas3s but can't afford it

I feel like not going to uni can be so much more than social influence though. A lot of people don't achieve what they could because of things like illness, be that hidden or disability or mental

And a lot of people just don't do well socially at that young age

Suitable trainers for gym at school. I mainly wore hand me downs and remember being bullied for my awful trainers.

I think it depends where you are. I’m not UK based but am involved with a children’s charity. They support a number of initiatives and specifically ones which are not covered by other agencies/institutions etc. Their areas include breakfast programs (which then give a lunch), paying for sports registration, extracurriculars including tuition, driving lessons. There are also programs to send food home with children, others to support independent youth. It’s been an eye opener

This thread is heartbreaking ❤️‍🩹
I grew up working class but not poor and had absolutely no idea how my friends may have been feeling .
Total respect to op for discussing this .