City Gateway

For more than 24 years, City Gateway have been working with young people in communities across London that are most impacted by social and economic inequality. We firmly believe that everyone should have the opportunity to reach their full potential. That their future should not be defined by the past or determined by the place they start.

That’s why we have established a hugely successful programme of support providing qualifications (functional skills level 2 in English and maths), essential employability skills and, thanks to our strategic corporate partners, employers and mentors, we provide experience (workshops, employer visits and experience within an employer’s workplace) to progress young people into successful outcomes in education, employment or further training. Once such outcome could be one of our apprenticeships in Business Administration or IT.

We also recognise the wider support they may need to overcome the barriers and hurdles they have faced in their young lives, and so we provide a wraparound coaching model which helps young learners to develop essential personal capabilities such as confidence, resilience and self-awareness.

Why do we do what we do

Michaela is just one of the young people we have supported. Here is her story;

“Right now, things seem rather desperate with the cost-of-living crisis, sky-high energy prices and inflation at the highest level for a generation. I’m struggling to afford food, I use a foodbank, and I worry about how to pay to heat my home. But things have been much worse than that for me. A few years ago I wasn’t in a great place, my mum had died, my mental health was suffering and I had no confidence in myself. At the time I thought there was no future for me. But there was, there is, thanks to City Gateway.

Thanks to City Gateway I can say with so much pride that I’m an apprentice! They helped me develop skills to make me employable – I never had a CV and had no clue where to start with a covering letter – and they helped me secure my apprenticeship. They took me from a place where I didn’t feel I had a shred of self-confidence to where I am now, brimming with confidence. I have to thank the coaching team for that. I’d never felt I could talk about what had happened and how I felt. But they listened. They actually cared. Not just about my future but about me, even supporting me with travel costs and there was always breakfast available to start the day right. I love their foodbank, I still use that today. I have been given so many new opportunities, and I go home every day with a new sense of fulfilment.

They gave me a safe space. But not just me, there are so many others like me. People who have faced similar challenges. I know others who have been homeless, some who have struggled with drug and alcohol use, others who have been deeply in debt, and some who are single parents. While we have all had different challenges in our past, there is one thing that we have all had in common – we have been in a place where we didn’t know where to turn, until we came to City Gateway.”

“City Gateway took me from a place where I didn’t feel I had a shred of self-confidence to where I am now, brimming with confidence.” Michaela, City Gateway Apprentice.

Please visit our website for more information on our Apprenticeships and Training.

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