Wednesday 23rd May 2007, 16:11Opening in StocktonLast Monday I was up in the North East opening both a new site and a new division with A4e, focusing on Enterprise and Education. Last week also saw the launch of 'Civic Pride' and the transfer of assets into the community. I was really pleased to see such a strong linkage between the plans we have been developing over the last two years on supporting alternative curriculum and enterprise in education and the idea of making better use of potentially 'redundant' 'civic space'.
Back to Thornaby and our team in Stockton working with local stakeholders to come up with a fantastic and creative approach to integrating and joining up public services for customers. Working with a local school and with great support from a range of stakeholder, including the Local Authority, A4e has relocated a range of new services into what was a 'disused' wing of Thornaby Community School.
This is a really exciting project for a number of reasons. The local Head Teacher is fantastic and shares our passion for creating new ways of joining up services so not only the children but the broader community benefits from the development of services from the site. In addition to our work on enterprise and education, A4e's team is involved in the delivery of adult information, advice and guidance services and our 'direct payment' team (working with vulnerable clients to give them more control over the use of their welfare and benefit entitlements) are co-located on the site.
It was great to see kids from the school peering through the door to see 'the world of work' on their doorstep. With lots of crossover between A4e and the school, this is having a vibrant and positive impact on children. We share resources with the school and more importantly, ideas and opportunities for working together. We want to use this new opening as a model for national and international work, making it a test bed in best practice for providing wider choice and joined up approaches to curriculum development, alternative curriculum approaches and joining the world of work to education in a meaningful and relevant way, particularly for those children at risk of exclusion.
The other nice thing about this project is making best use of community resources. In speaking to the Local Authority and Head of Governors, it was clear that with a change in demographics and a declining attendance roll, the school potentially had a problem. The wing we now occupy would have been vacant and at risk of vandalism and falling into disrepair. Instead, we have a vibrant, unusual and creative public-private partnership, focused on developing services for its community. Not quite what the Quirk Review is about, but a great example of how this agenda can drive better services for local people with creative thinking.
So if you know any schools that have unused space, or Local Authorities pondering what to do, feel free to drop us a line and we can see if we can work with local stakeholders to do something similar.
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