Guiding Young Minds (GYM) as a service, grew and developed from the charity ASSIST Trauma Care; a specialist therapeutic organisation dedicated to supporting people who have suffered psychological trauma.

GYM is now a therapeutic service which recognises that young people caught up in gangs and knife crime have often experienced adverse childhood events, and deployed inside communities through a purpose designed and built minibus.

The GYM Youth Bus

Making the GYM service a mobile solution, within a purpose built vehicle and going into the heart of community areas where at-risk young people live, is a preventative and trauma-centred approach to tackle the root causes (and help young people escape from) crime, violence, exploitation and barriers to social mobility.

Mobilising an outreach service actually evolved from the comprehensive Youth Endowment Fund evaluation of GYM community provisions between 2019 to 2022; which collected and evaluated of GYM outcome data, plus carried out interviews with young people, parents, teachers and social workers.

In 2026 within the Pluggin Marketplace, public procurement is supporting the GYM Youth Bus as a solution towards building healthier, safer and more resilient communities; a deployable solution in support of the Police & Crime Plan objectives set-out with police, councils and criminal justice services.

Through the social value contributed within public contracts from business suppliers to the emergencies services, councils, NHS and criminal justices services, the GYM Youth Bus is now a long-term solution where continual outreach sessions take place in town squares, parks and even by the side of the road.

The GYM Youth Bus operates as a mobile youth club transporting a variety of sports and games equipment, staffed by specialists in trauma-informed youth work and counselling - removing the cost of use for young people, giving back vital access to youth provisions as part of wider community safety activities within at-risk areas.