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Find out about how you can get involved and participate in Brook’s work, and in doing so gain knowledge, skills and experience.
Information for parents and carers
Participation means giving people the opportunity to get involved in decisions that could affect them. Children and young people have this guaranteed to them through Article 12 of the United Nations Convention on the Right’s of the Child (UNCRC).
Participating with Brook involves taking part in opportunities where you can have your voice heard, be actively involved in decision making, and create measurable and positive change in Brook services through co-design.
Brook is committed to involving children, young people, and adults at every level in the organisation and ensuring that their experiences and voices inform our work.
We have made a commitment to working with young people for the years ahead and are proud to have signed the iwill #PowerOfYouth Charter.
Some examples of how getting involved with our participation work can benefit you are:
Read more about what member’s think about Participation at Brook in our report.
Find out about member’s experiences 2022-2024 (pdf)
There are different ways you can get involved in participation at Brook, ranging in commitment and time level
Ad hoc opportunities to get involved with Brook’s work. Usually involves surveys or focus groups to provide feedback on Brook’s services and new developments that help fight stigma around sexual health and wellbeing.
A recent example was a survey about our online dating webpages which have been amended using people’s feedback.
Anyone can be involved in ad hoc opportunities. There’s no time commitment so it’s a great option if you want to volunteer with Brook but don’t have much free time.
Express an interest in wider opportunities
Every year Brook sets a promise to work with three new participation groups to hear from local communities and to improve Brook services at a local level. These groups help us review our services, offer us new ideas and ways to embed local voices in what we do.
In 2022, we worked with young people in the Wirral and Manchester in local participation groups as well as a group with professionals from across England.
The National forums help Brook to look at sexual health and wellbeing at a national level, hearing voices from across the UK.
We have three national Participation Advisory Groups:
National groups help us to look at sexual health and wellbeing at a national level, hearing voices from across the UK.
We aren’t currently recruiting for the National Participation Advisory Groups.
Our Participation Committee are democratically elected by their peers in each National Participation Advisory Group to feed back about participation and bring forward new ideas to Brook’s Board of Trustees.
Meet the current participation committee
Our Participation Committee are democratically elected by their peers in each National Participation Advisory Group to feedback about participation and bring forward new ideas to Brook’s Board of Trustees.
25+ Participation Committee Representative
Cassie is a Sexual Health Nurse, Psychosexual Therapist in training, and an award-winning neurodivergent sex educator. From service user to trustee, Brook has always been an important part of Cassie’s life. Cassie joined Brook’s Participation Advisory Group in 2021 and then went on to become a PAG committee member and is now a Brook Trustee. Over the years, Cassie has supported Brook in so many ways including speaking at Brook’s 60th event, contributing to PAG projects and creating content for Brook’s social media platforms.
Cassie is also Co-Chair of Kop Outs, LFC’s LGBTQ+ supporters group, and holds a seat on LFC’s Supporters Board. Cassie is the founder of Radical Love: a platform dedicated to queer, feminist activism and sexual health, bringing honest, inclusive, shame-free information to wide audiences online.
20-24 Participation Committee Representative
Jade, aged 24 and originally from the small town, Redcar, began involvement with Brook’s participation work in 2017. From the start, Jade contributed to a wide range of projects, including work on RSE legislation, Brook campaigns, and efforts to ensure Brook’s voice and mission were expressed clearly and confidently. Commitment to challenging unnecessary taboos surrounding an everyday aspect of life has been a major motivation for Jade’s continued involvement with Brook. The focus has consistently been to create meaningful change and encouraging people to understand life from multiple angles and viewpoints.
Across the years, Jade has taken part in numerous projects and events, including collaboration with partners such as the Terrence Higgins Trust on RSE legislation, participation in political conferences, and outreach work at festivals. Jade has also contributed to shaping Participation into its current form at Brook.
16-19 Participation Committee Representative
Nikki is 18 and from Manchester and has been a member of the Brook Advisory Group since April 2024. During this time, she has contributed in a range of ways, including speaking at Brook’s 60th birthday event, the 2025 Hay Festival ‘My Body, My Right’ panel, and an APPG on ‘What Does Youth-Friendly Sexual and Reproductive Health Look Like in 2026? As well as presenting on a youth panel at the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV (BASHH) and British HIV Association (BHIVA) conference in Liverpool, discussing what young people want from today’s sexual health services.
Nikki is currently on a gap year, working, volunteering and hopes to travel, and will be starting a degree in Maths and Computer Science at university.
For the last 15 years Sarah has worked with young people across the UK, including 3 years working and volunteering in Malawi, Africa. Over the last 5 years Sarah has managed Brook’s participation work, overseeing 40-50 national participation advisory group members each for a 2-year term.
As Participation Manager, Sarah believes that participation is fundamental to any person-centred organisation. Guided by the Lundy Model, she leads Brook’s participation work to ensure that people’s voices and lived experiences are meaningfully embedded in the organisation. This helps improve Brook’s services and ensures they reflect what people truly want and need.
Over the past 5 years Alice has worked with young people and adults across the UK supporting them in a variety of ways, always centring their voices and needs.
Having previously supported Brook’s Advisory Groups as an Education and Wellbeing Specialist, she now supports as part of the Communications team ensuring that the voices of the groups are heard and amplified in meaningful ways. Alice translates young people’s and adult’s insights into accessible, engaging content, making sure their contributions are visible across campaigns, reports, and social media which is seen by the wider world. Alice also helps to build advisory group member’s confidence and skills in storytelling and digital communication, while strengthening feedback loops by clearly showing how their input influences decisions
Brook regularly works with external organsiations including Universities and charities to support them to co-design their services or to explore their research objective.
Some of our recent and current partners who Brook has worked with within participatory research and co-design projects include: University of Birmingham, Oxford Brookes, Department for Education, Safe Lives, Time to Raise it and the Eve Appeal.
If you’re a professional and are interested in collaborating with Brook around participation opportunities for children and young people, or adults, please contact the Participation Team.