Five Rivers' biggest Care Day celebration ever

Exeter-based child care provider, Five Rivers, held its biggest Care Day event ever, with around 300 foster carers, children and young people and staff, from across the nation and the Republic of Ireland, tuning in for an evening of presentations and performances.

On the evening of Thursday, 18 February, Five Rivers held its fifth annual Care Day event. Care Day is an internationally recognised awareness day that celebrates the rights of children and young people with care experience. This year, Five Rivers organised a virtual event based on the theme of ‘Love’ and what that means, which was chosen by the children. The event was hosted by several panellists who weaved the theme into their presentations and performances to inspire children in care, as well as their foster families.

Care-experienced rap artist, Ric Flo, talked about his life growing up in care and how it doesn’t stop you from achieving great things. He performed a number of songs that were enjoyed by the children. Poet and mental health activist, Clare Shaw, who also has social care experience, spoke to the children about the simplicity of love and how we can find it in everyday life. Clare also explained how writing and poetry is a great tool to express your emotions.

In the lead up to the event, a number of activities and workshops were held with children from all over England and the Republic of Ireland, with the finished creations turned into short films that were showcased at the event. Clare Shaw held several virtual workshops and talked about why she loves poetry and how to craft a poem. Arts organisation, Daisi, also held multiple workshops to teach the children how to express themselves through the medium of art.

Five Fivers also partnered with Fine Art students from the University of Plymouth, who taught the children how to draw self-portraits. Five Rivers created a mosaic using nearly 300 self-portraits with the word ‘Love’ at the centre, bringing the artwork together. Last week, Five Rivers’ Participation Manager, Olivia Doherty, took to the streets of Plymouth and projected the mosaic onto the University’s Campus and other locations.

Olivia Doherty, National Participation and Engagement Officer, at Five Rivers Child Care, said: “I am blown away by the success of this year’s event, and how wonderful each performance was. Five years ago, our children and young people told us that they wanted a day to celebrate children in care, which is when we stumbled upon Care Day. Since then, the awareness of Care Day has increased, and our events have grown too. For the first time, we held our event online, but it enabled us to include our children in care from all over the country. The readings of their poetry, with all their beautiful accents, showed us just how diverse we are as an organisation.

“There’s no stopping us now, we are thrilled at how the event went this year, but we’re already making plans to make next year bigger.”

The event also featured talks from Pam McConnell, CEO and Founder of Five Rivers Child Care, and Deirdre McDonagh, the Managing Director of Five Rivers Ireland, as well as Eleanor Seed from organisation, Investing in Children.

To find out more information and to view the children’s work, visit:https://five-rivers.org/news/five-rivers-care-day-21-event/.