The What? Centre is a Young Person’s Advice and Counselling Service whose main base is Stourbridge and has another building in Dudley.  The Centre was formed in March 1989 and the need for the project was identified by a local Child and Family Strategy Group in Stourbridge who identified that there was nowhere for young people to go. 

The What? Centre has been providing an essential advice and counselling service for young people for 34 years and its reputation grows year by year.  Our Mission Statement is to provide a high quality client centred service for young people mainly between the ages of 13 and 25 but sometimes has funding for 10-12 year olds as well. Our Counselling Service has accreditation from the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP), has been awarded the Queens Award (equivalent to an MBE for the Voluntary Sector) and has the Investors in People Standard. Our counselling service is accredited by the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP). The service therefore works to the Ethical Framework which you can access here. 

Our main work is providing one-to-one counselling services for young people on a wider range of issues such as depression, anxiety, OCD, anger problems, eating disorders, bullying, relationship and family problems, self- loathing and low self-esteem.  We also provide services complimentary to those such as group work on issues such as anger management and low self-esteem and more recently has also held other activities such as half-term and summer programmes for young people aged 13-18. 
The organisation also specialises in supporting LGBTQ young people and holds weekly LGBTQ+ groups for 13-18’s and another group for 18-25’s, we also have thriving transgender groups. (see also our new BeeHIVE project which extends these services). Over the years the Centre has provided a much used advice service for local young people on a range of issues including housing, benefits, foodbank vouchers and through another project we have on board we have been able to provide some advice sessions in schools, colleges and community settings (see our YIF Project). The Centre is now looking to develop its work with Families and this need has been identified through our links with families who often refer their child but also through Pilot Work completed last year where members of our Team were trained in Systemic Family Practice (See Family Section). Our reputation is very high and a great deal of our referrals are directly from GP’s, CAMHS and iCAMHS, and from hospitals, or from parents or young people who have been to see their GP.
We also have good relationships with Local Senior Schools and provide some of their counselling Services (See Schools). The Centre is a registered Charity No. 1064579 and all funds are by way of Service Level Agreements, contracts, funding applications and donations.  The Centre has contracts with the CCG and Public Health and holds a number of other contracts through successful funding bids.  However, demand always outstrips the funding available and so donations are always very gratefully received.