Wolverhampton University secures £35,000 for projects focused on healthy lifestyles and organ donation

The university's Centre for Sikh and Panjabi Studies (CSPS) has secured the cash, and the centre's director, Dr Opinderjit Kaur Takhar, has brought together a team of academics to deliver the projects.

The team are from the university’s School of Society and Community, School of Public Health, School of Allied Health and the Wolverhampton School of Art.

One of the projects concentrates on delivering and disseminating a Healthy Lifestyles Toolkit to the Sikh community in Birmingham, which has been funded by Birmingham City Council.

CSPS was previously commissioned by Birmingham City Council to write the Healthy Lifestyles Toolkit, which can be found on its website.

Another of the projects, also funded by the council, focusses on disseminating the Hindu Healthy Lifestyles Toolkit to the Hindu community in Birmingham.

The dissemination of both the Sikh and Hindu Toolkits will primarily take place in places of worship and community hubs.

The checklist will function as a monitoring tool to assess the impact that the dissemination has made on the lifestyle choices amongst Hindus and Sikhs in Birmingham.

The third project, funded by NHS Blood and Transplant, will deliver awareness events amongst Sikhs, Hindus, Buddhists and Jains in Wolverhampton and Birmingham.

This follows the successfully completed previous project around organ donation amongst Sikhs in Wolverhampton.

Dr Takhar said: “We are delighted to have received the funding to carry out these projects which have community health issues as their focus.

"The toolkits cover a variety of areas such as physical exercise, healthy eating, addressing mental health and many more.

“The engagement will take place in places of worship which highlights that the Centre for Sikh and Panjabi Studies plays a key role in the health of the region.

"We have an excellent team of colleagues from across the Faculty of Education, Health and Wellbeing, together with the Wolverhampton School of Art who will work collaboratively in delivering these projects.

“In keeping with the ethos of place and presence, the Centre for Sikh and Panjabi Studies is also on the steering board of an exciting project from the Wolverhampton Art Gallery which focusses on the Sikh and Panjabi community in Wolverhampton.

"This is part of a larger national project by the National Portrait Gallery titled Citizen UK.”