Founder of Blaze Trails hosts talk with human rights and law students
- Thursday, March 17, 2022
Katy O’Neill Gutierrez spoke about the development of Blaze Trails from one small pilot group to a thriving national network.
Katy O’Neill Gutierrez, founder of Blaze Trails, hosted a talk about her own social action journey with students on our MA Human Rights and International Relations and LLM Human Rights and Legal Practice programmes.
Blaze Trails is the UK’s parent and baby walking network. There are over 40 local parent and baby walking groups across the country, with parents coming together regularly for baby-carrying, pushchair and toddler walks.
The aim of the organisation is to support people by building the confidence and skills to get outside with their babies, and to provide free and inclusive spaces for parents to talk, make friends, experience the benefits of being outdoors and improve their postnatal mental health.
Blaze Trails became a Community Interest Company (CIC) in 2021, and Katy and a small team of volunteers now support other parents to set up their own local groups across the UK. The network is made up of over 7000 members, and is growing rapidly with new groups opening every week.
Katy spoke to students at the University of Roehampton about her desire to remain active and adventurous in new parenthood, her lived experience of birth trauma and postnatal anxiety, and the lack of free, inclusive, peer-led spaces for parents to talk and be themselves.
This led to the creation of Blaze Trails, which started as one small pilot group but soon turned into a thriving national network.
After learning about Katy’s innovation, students were encouraged to question what practical and emotional steps they could consider when starting a social enterprise – from brand and marketing, managing volunteers and technical infrastructure to building partnerships and planning for sustainability. Students left the talk with Katy with a comprehensive, inspiring guide on embarking on their own social action journey.
Dr Jennifer Melvin, Senior Lecturer in Sociology and Human Rights at the University of Roehampton, said:
“Blaze Trails is an incredible organization, creating communities in outdoor spaces. Katy's honest and open talk about creating Blaze showed our students that they don't need to wait for an NGO to step in and solve problems, they can do it themselves.”