WHAT IS CATALYST?
Our Mission
CATALYST 4 CHANGE supports community organisations, social enterprises, faith groups or businesses that have a significant African and Caribbean mental health / wellbeing service user base.
We do this by providing learning seminars, networking/collaboration opportunities, capacity building, incubation support, representation, research support and access to a professional services directory.
OUR HISTORY & WHAT WE KNOW
The organisation was first conceived in 2016 by founding directors Sandra Griffiths and Tippa Naphtali, and was formally incorporated as a Community Interest Company on 19 June 2017.
At CATALYST 4 CHANGE we know that African and Caribbean communities are holders of huge reserves of social capital, of assets and resources, skills and talents, knowledge and experience... yet much of this remains unknown and little understood or utilised by our public agencies.
CATALYST 4 CHANGE has a powerful social mission to help strengthen the capacity of voluntary, grassroots and user led organisations to ensure that communities can access the right care, at the right time and, most importantly, in the right place
We know that a key route to change is in making better and more creative use of the African and Caribbean communities social capital; existing research, forging stronger productive partnerships between researchers/academics/theorists; community activists/experts and by experienced practitioners and mental health services in both the statutory and voluntary sector.
Adopting the role of ‘positive deviants’, we plan to avoid some of the familiar problems with addressing concerns related to the mental health experiences of African and Caribbean communities and the failure to synthesize evidence drawn from lived experience, good practice and practical expertise with theory and evidence from the research literature.
