Roundabout – The Local Youth Housing Charity

Good Causes Exhibitor 

ROUNDABOUT is Sheffield’s local youth housing charity, providing shelter, support and life skills to young people. We give emergency accommodation for homeless young people at our direct access hostel and support young people to live independently in secure bedsits and in shared housing throughout the city. Roundabout also offers young people a comprehensive programme of training and involvement which breaks the cycle of homelessness and develops long term independent living skills.

Roundabout first opened its doors to young homeless people in Sheffield on 4 January l977.  In l976, Sheffield Family Housing Association, now South Yorkshire Housing Association Ltd, indicated it was willing to join Sheffield Youth Development Trust in seeking accommodation and hence, by January l977, the first Roundabout opened.

The first Roundabout had three beds and an outside toilet. Roundabout now has an emergency Direct Access Hostel, Resettlement Team as well as a Supporting Tenants Team (formerly Stencil) for any young person in the city moving into or already living in their own tenancy, including council, housing association or private rented.  The Direct Access Hostel is now in its third home, occupying four adjoining terraced houses close to Sheffield city centre.  We also have a specialist worker based within the Youth Justice Service, who works with young offenders and care leavers around housing.

Prevention is important to Roundabout, so in June 2014 we opened our Homeless Prevention Service which offers family mediation and advice for young people at risk of becoming homeless. Our Peer Education project works with current and ex-service users to deliver sessions in school to explain homelessness and prevention.

Our Aims

• To support and empower young people who are homeless, to recognise, develop and take advantage of the choices open to them.
• To encourage and assist young people who are homeless, to act upon issues that affect them and to participate fully as confident citizens in their communities.
• To provide high-quality, effective and flexible housing, care and support services to meet the diverse needs of young people who are homeless and to develop appropriate new services as those needs change.

Our Values

• We believe that young people have the right and ability to make their own choices.
• We believe that young people have the ability, given the opportunity to make changes to their lives and those of others.
• We believe that young people have the right to and should be treated with respect, honesty and fairness.
• We believe that issues faced by individual young people must be viewed within a wider social, political and cultural context and not as a personal failing.
• We believe it is vital that young people are included fully in the decision making process within Roundabout and the community at large.

Roundabout has a team of staff and volunteers dedicated to providing the best possible service to young people. As well as our main services, we also employ a small team of administrators Sue (Administrative Supervisor) Pat (Aministrative Assistant) and finance Team consisting of Sandra (Financial Controller) and Jimmy (Finance Project Worker).

Our Senior Management Team is always happy to hear from you, so please don’t hesitate to get in touch on the details below.

Phone number: 0114 2536789
Ben Keegan, Chief Executive Officer: bkeegan@roundaboutltd.org
Tracey Jackson, Deputy Chief Executive Officer: tjackson@roundaboutltd.org