Centre Social Salengro is a Community Centre in Armentieres. Their activities include social inclusion and empowering children and adults while helping them to take an active part in the local community life and work.
A physical hub
Since January 2021, we have created a physical hub in Armentières, a place where the young people can gather in small groups to work on their project, but also where they can have training and meet one counsellor (on entrepreneurship, but also for social &/or professional integration). We also have a room with computers and another one with a fab lab and 3D printers.
We have been hosting several group training sessions, see photo below.
Community analysis
We have also led a community analysis with a group of youngsters that we hired with a special French contract (called Service Civique - it is paid by the state, to enable young people to have a first professional experience in an NGO).
This enabled us to identify 3 main needs felt by the inhabitants of our territory :
1. lack of infrastructure in the neighbourhood, especially concerning transportation
2. lack of cleanliness in the neighbourhood that is seen as very urban and unpleasant to live in
3. housing problems (decrepitude of the housing, and difficulties to change accommodation).
Three pop-ups in creation
In response to those needs, some youngsters were interested in developing solutions.
1. One is working on a "bike mending" pop up for which we had a publication in the local newspaper
2. Three are working on a carpentry workshop, in order to build or fix furniture to help improve the housing
3. One is working on a cleaning and festive walk during the summer
4. One is working on a small business where he could transport parcels or people on his bike to help improve people's mobility with the territory.
