The City of Edinburgh Music School is holding on Open Day at Broughton High School on Saturday 7 November from 11am – 2pm.
Tag: education
Hope springs eternal!
Hope wins Outstanding Achiever award Continue reading Hope springs eternal!
OMG! College offers digital industry skills programme
Edinburgh College gives budding digital creatives the chance to make it with BBC scheme
Edinburgh College is giving creative young unemployed people who love likes, hashtags and telling stories online the chance to take the first steps towards a digital industry career.
The college’s eight-week BBC Make it Digital programme will teach skills to unemployed young people including: digital storytelling, building a website, planning a social media campaign, shooting and editing a film and learning how to pitch creative ideas to business.
The training programme was designed by the BBC Academy and is open to unemployed people between 16-24. It will take place at the college’s Milton Road Campus, where students will work with industry-standard software. The course will start on 2 November.
Taking part in this programme does not affect benefits and those between 16 and 18 on the programme will receive £55 per week Training Allowance. Travelling expenses are also part of the support.
Students will spend three weeks on work placements with local employers, who will ask them to design a social media campaign.
Make it Digital is a national scheme but the programme in Scotland has the added benefit of a recognised SQA qualification – the National Progression Award in Enterprise and Employability.
Trainees will also take part in a Radio 1 challenge based in London, where the best entries will be shortlisted into the final recruitment stages for a year-long Radio 1 Apprenticeship.
As well as new digital skills, students will also learn employability skills including business networking, CV and interview tips, budgeting, project management and creating an online portfolio. By the end of the training, participants will greatly improve their chances of finding a job or a modern apprenticeship.
Jon Buglass, head of Creative Industries at Edinburgh College, said: “This is a fantastic opportunity for young people to start to develop the skills they need to make it in the creative digital industry. The digital sector is one of the fastest-growing industries in the UK at the moment as businesses now rely on an online presence to survive. We’re excited to be working with the BBC Academy and Skills Development Scotland to give unemployed young people the chance to build digital and employability skills to help them make their way back into the workplace.”
Skills Development Scotland is funding the programme through the Employability Fund. Contact the Edinburgh Skills Development Scotland Careers Centre on 0131 718 2040 or speak to a Jobcentre Work Coach to find out how to apply for this course.
You’d be MAD to miss local cooking classes!
Mums and dads cookery classes start at Craigie on Monday
Six of the best for College students!
Graphics students learn from the best in new Edinburgh College design partnership
Some of the city’s top design agencies have teamed up with Edinburgh College to show students the inner workings of the industry and help them become the next professional stars.
Six design agencies have signed up to a new partnership scheme with the college to give graphic design students industry experience and insight while they are still studying. Mentors from the agencies will coach students over the next year, giving them work placements, setting them briefs and advising on projects including work for real clients.
The agencies – Whitespace; Blonde; Teviot; Union Direct; Equator; and LEWIS – will in turn get access to the best graduates, working with them to ensure their skills and knowledge meet the needs of the industry and support its growth.
The new partnership builds on the success of the HND Visual Communication: Graphic Design course’s existing mentorship programme, which has been pairing students with mentors for the last seven years and now works with 13 agencies. The six agencies now signed up as official partners will provide further opportunities over and above mentoring so students can experience all sides of the industry, as well as sponsoring the students’ end-of-year show.
The project launched with an event at the college’s Granton Campus, where students got to meet their mentors for the first time.
Graphic design lecturer Helena Good said: “Bringing the design agencies on board as partners will be great for the students as it gives them new ways of getting the knowledge about the industry that they’ll need when they enter the workplace. Having access to professionals working to incredibly high standards in the latest practices, including digital, and getting their honest feedback and guidance is invaluable to their development.
“The mentoring project we started seven years ago has really taken off, and we’re lucky to have so many great companies so keen to be involved. Formalising these partnerships is a natural step and really embeds this project and the students themselves firmly within the city’s design community.”
As well as allotted time with mentors throughout the year, some partners will provide up to a month’s worth of work experience placements. They will also each set groups of students one-day ‘guerilla’ design projects, where mentors will turn up unannounced in the morning and set a design challenge to be completed in a day. Mentors also help students work on intensive one-week design projects working on real briefs from real clients, which in previous years have included Innis & Gunn, Edinburgh Zoo and GF Smith.
One of the mentors at partner Teviot, Kirsten Murray, who studied the HND at the college and graduated in 2007, said: “Whatever stage you are at in your education or career, having a mentor to support you, challenge you and ask you hard questions is invaluable. I have watched the mentoring programme go from strength to strength over the last five years. The success of the programme is clear when you see the quality of the ideas and the design work being produced by the students.
“As a former student of Edinburgh College, it means a lot to me to be able to give something back to the very place that kick started my career in design. The future of design in Scotland will soon be in the hands of these students. That’s why it’s so important that we help them to become industry-ready graduates.”
Student Alex De Sousa, 18, from Bonnyrigg, said: “This doesn’t happen anywhere else and it’s really exciting. It’s incredible that we get to spend time one to one with people with such great experience and it’s such a good opportunity.”
Gillian Grant, an account director at LEWIS, said: “The more you work with and get to know the students the more you can see that they are hungry to learn in all areas. There’s lots they can learn from an account management and project management perspective to complement the creative side and help them understand all sides of the industry. You can offer process-driven advice and recommendations on pitching, and demonstrate how all areas of an agency work together to achieve a goal.”
Closing the gap: city council to focus on child poverty
Edinburgh is one of the richest and most successful cities in the UK and regularly appears high on the list of most desirable places to live – and yet one in every five of our children are growing up in poverty. And in areas like Forth, Craigmillar and Wester Hailes the plight of children is even worse – there, the figures are one on four as families face the daily challenge of trying to make ends meet.
Despite the efforts of successive governments – and because of the legislation introduced by some of them – the gap between rich and poor continues to grow, and tackling child poverty is the focus of a new awareness drive being spearheaded by the City of Edinburgh Council.
A report going to the Education, Children and Families Committee next week (Tuesday 6 October) shows that just over 21% of children in Edinburgh live in poverty and this figure is forecast to increase significantly by 2020.
Every area of the city is affected with each Council ward having child poverty rates of over 10% and it’s estimated that the cost of delivering services to address the impact in the Capital is around £156m a year.
Next week’s Child Poverty report outlines various actions being taken by the Council to lessen the impact.
Key areas identified include:
*Developing more flexible and affordable good quality childcare to meet the needs of families on low incomes
*Improving attendance at schools and early years establishments, and the attainment and achievement of young people
*Reducing the attainment gap between lowest achieving pupils and their peers across the city
*Identifying and developing more safe places to play
Other actions include increasing breakfast club provision, working in partnership with food banks to better understand why families in poverty are using their services and further developing family engagement with a focus on strong home-school partnerships.
A major school project – the ‘1 in 5: Raising Awareness of Child Poverty in Edinburgh’ – has already started in five primaries and one secondary school. It aims to identify best practice and changes that can be introduced to make school more affordable for families on low incomes. The project involves working with children, staff and parents to challenge the stigma that affects children living in poverty.
The report also highlights the importance of income maximisation to raising attainment. Research has shown that the level of household income plays a major role in attainment levels with more initiatives needed to increase wages, encourage take up of unclaimed benefits and other finance-related poverty costs.
Councillor Paul Godzik, Education, Children and Families Convener, said: “Child poverty matters to us all as it damages childhoods, damages life chances and damages society as a whole. Children from poorer backgrounds lag behind at all stages of education so it’s important we do all we can to close the attainment gap.
“We have developed a range of actions to challenge and mitigate the impact of child poverty in the Capital and will continue to work closely with our partner agencies to ensure everything is done to ensure children given every opportunity to have the best possible start in life.”
Alison Noble, Head Teacher at Sciennes Primary School, is one of the schools taking ‘1 in 5: Raising Awareness of Child Poverty in Edinburgh’ project.
She said: “This project provides a valuable opportunity for Sciennes to make a difference and ensure the outcomes for our children are not undermined by poverty and inequality. By taking part we can focus our efforts on addressing the barriers that exist within our community and help us to begin to fulfil one of the objectives in the Scottish Attainment Challenge – to close the attainment gap and provide every child with the same opportunity to succeed.
“Our ward includes an area of multiple deprivation so raising awareness of the issues surrounding poverty may contribute to our children making a positive contribution to the school, local and wider community.”
City crackdown on catchment fraud
Council clamping down on school place cheats
Six families have lost their school places after being caught giving false statements to get their children into popular city primaries in a crackdown by the City of Edinburgh Council.
As a result of the investigations by the Council’s fraud team, the offer of places was withdrawn and several other families dropped their requests when they discovered they were being investigated.
In some cases, families were also found to be fraudulently claiming housing and council tax benefits and were then forced to repay the money. In one instance, where a tenant was discovered to be sub-letting their council house, they lost their tenancy.
Councillor Paul Godzik, Convener of Education, Children and Families, said: “We know this is an issue that concerns many parents and we take it very seriously.
“If we believe there is a possibility that fraud is being committed, we will investigate. If we discover this to be the case we will withdraw the school place.
“By working with the Council’s fraud team, we are able to access a greater range of information, including credit checks, and this has allowed us to identify instances of fraud. Anecdotally we believe there are a number of schools in the city where this is likely to be a greater issue than others and we investigate all potential cases. This year we plan to put these schools under greater scrutiny with spot checks at different stages of the process.”
When registering for a school place for the first time, parents need to provide a council tax demand notice and recent utility bill. If someone is moving house they need to provide proof of purchase and their tenancy agreement. If they are moving to a different Edinburgh address they will also need to provide proof of sale or termination of lease.
When pupils move from primary to secondary school they are allocated a place based on the current address information held by their school. Spot checks will be carried out to ensure this is accurate.
The Corporate Fraud Team can carry out credit checks, check council tax records and carry out unannounced home visits to establish whether or not someone is actually living at the address they claim to be at. If nobody is at home when they visit, they will speak to neighbours to try and find out if they know who was living in the house.
And the fraud team will continue their address checks during the school registration process which starts in November.
Anyone who believes a parent has given false information to register for a school place can contact the school placing team on 0131 469 3033 or email school.placements@edinburgh.
Edinburgh College student Sarah is ‘tres bon’!
Auld Alliance: Award for Scotland’s top French student
An Edinburgh College student said ‘bonjour‘ to success as she was crowned the country’s best Advanced Higher French student after working her way to top marks in her final exam.
Sarah McArthur scored 190 out of 200 in her final exam, the highest mark in the country. The Franco-Scottish Society has presented her with the Lansdowne Prize, awarded annually to the candidate who achieves the best mark in Advanced Higher French.
Sarah studied for the qualification at the college through open learning while completing her sixth year at Balerno High School, which was unable to run the Advanced Higher course.
Her college lecturer, Caroline Cordier, said: “I am extremely proud of Sarah. I would like to emphasise the difficulty of the Advanced Higher exam. The Advanced Higher courses is a huge jump from Higher and is very challenging academically. Taking an Advanced Higher course is the perfect way to prepare yourself for progressing to university study.
“Her achievement is all the more outstanding considering that she took an open learning course, which requires a great deal of self-motivation. Thanks to resources and feedback available through new tools like Skype tutorials, Sarah was able to make huge progress and have a fulfilling learning experience.”
Sarah, who is now going to the University of St Andrews to study Sustainable Development and hopes to work for charities in the developing world, said: “I was surprised and delighted to discover that I had won the Lansdowne Prize, and I am of course very grateful to the Franco-Scottish Society for presenting me with this award and for the support they give to French language learners.
“I am also very grateful to Edinburgh College for running the course, as otherwise I would have been unable to study Advanced Higher French. I am especially grateful to my lecturer Caroline. She was so flexible and willing to work around my busy timetable as I’m sure I was not the most convenient student.”
Tom Wight, vice-president of Franco-Scottish Society of Scotland, said: “Sarah McArthur’s results in the Advanced Higher Exam are outstanding. She is a worthy recipient of the prize and an inspiration to young language learners throughout Scotland.”
Since studying at the college, Sarah has taken part in an eight-month placement in the Democratic Republic of Congo with Africa Inland Mission where she taught English to English teacher trainees and developed her French-language skills.
Pictured: Lecturer Caroline Cordier, Sarah McArthur, Franco-Scottish Society of Scotland president the Rt Hon Lord Brodie, vice president Tom Wight and honorary treasurer Anne Collette Lequet.
Some places are still available on a range of part-time Higher and Advanced Higher courses at Edinburgh College including a range of languages courses such as French, Spanish, Italian, German and Gaelic.
For more information on available courses, visit www.edinburghcollege.ac.uk/august2015/pt.aspx
Time to Shine? Arts the way to do it!
Culture Secretary visits Youth Arts Hub
Culture Secretary Fiona Hyslop toured Edinburgh’s Youth Arts Hub yesterday and met young people whose lives have been changed by the Government-funded scheme.
The Edinburgh Youth Arts Hub, called #artcore, received £289,087 of funding from Creative Scotland as part of Time to Shine, Scotland’s Youth Arts Strategy, and is one of nine youth arts hubs across Scotland designed to give young people from all backgrounds a chance to take part in the arts.
The hubs act as focal points for regional youth arts delivery, helping to nurture and celebrate ambition, enthusiasm and talent in Scotland’s young people by improving the regional infrastructure. Young people are given the chance to be involved in running of the hubs themselves.
Ms Hyslop visited the hub, based at the Out of the Blue Drill Hall in Dalmeny Street, and met apprentices working at #artcore as well as members of Youth Arts Voice Scotland, a national advisory group of young people aged 12 to 25 who ensure Time to Shine is informed by the views and needs of young people.
Ms Hyslop said: “It was great to meet some of the young people who have had a chance to participate in arts and culture thanks to Time to Shine, Scotland’s Youth Arts Strategy, and #artcore, and hear about the difference the hub is making to their lives.
“#artcore received £289,087 of funding from Creative Scotland to help it open up access to arts and creativity for children and young people in Edinburgh. We understand arts and creativity can have a huge positive impact in people’s lives, and Scotland’s nine Youth Arts Hubs aim to give young people all over the country the chance to take part.
“Culture, the arts and creativity play an important role in tackling inequality, and Time to Shine builds on the well-established links between culture, education, youth employment and personal development.
“It is not only about providing enhanced access opportunities for all of Scotland’s young people but it goes further to support meaningful career pathways for our talent of the future; be it on stage, the screen, behind the scenes or in our world-leading creative industries.
“Perhaps most importantly of all, our aim is that this engagement with culture will nurture personal qualities that will help our young people to grow confidently as citizens and towards realising their ambitions, wherever they lie in the arts or elsewhere.”
#artcore project manager Johnny Gailey said: “It’s great to have both the Cabinet Secretary, and young people from Youth Arts Voice Scotland, to visit to see how #artcore has progressed, since we got our Time to Shine funding to set up a youth arts hub in Edinburgh a year ago.
“In the past year, we have employed a team of four young apprentices to run our programme of multi-arts activity – we’ve worked with over 500 young people in a series of pilot projects involving gaming, animation, radio plays, circus skills, music, creative writing and self publishing. And we’re now at the exciting point of announcing our expanded autumn arts programme at sites throughout the city, as well as launching our new print social enterprise, Out of the Blueprint.”
Joan Parr, Creative Scotland’s Head of Creative Learning said:
“Placing young people at the centre of the strategy’s aims and ambitions is a core principle of Time To Shine and we are delighted by the extent to which the Time To Shine implementation programme has so far taken its lead from young people.
“#Artcore Edinburgh is very much a youth led Arts Hub and therefore provides the ideal setting for our national Youth Arts Voice Scotland group to reflect with the Cabinet Secretary on what’s been achieved through Time To Shine to date, and what can still be achieved in supporting Scotland’s young people to flourish and achieve in and through the arts and creativity.”
Blair Boyle, YAVS Member, said: “As YAVS we are delighted to be presenting the progress of Time To Shine to the Cabinet Secretary. We are playing a key role alongside Creative Scotland and Young Scot in the development of the strategy implementation programme and we think it’s vital that young people continue to have a strong voice at this level influencing policy and decision making.
“We are proud that Scotland has such a powerful arts strategy for young people and are excited to be at #artcore today to be able to share with the Cabinet Secretary the breadth and depth of the work that is now happenening across the country.”
Chief Executive of Young Scot Louise Macdonald said: “We are really lucky that there is such a wealth of creative talent right here in Scotland and that there are young people who are so passionate about championing it.
“The young people involved in Youth Arts Voice Scotland are nothing short of inspirational in their drive and ambition to make the arts more accessible to young people right across Scotland. Their hard work and enthusiasm is encouraging young people right across the country get involved in arts programmes, securing our future as a creative nation.
“I am proud that we, in partnership with Creative Scotland, have been able to bring these young people together, so they can meet, discuss and ultimately grow their passion together with other likeminded young people.”
Last chance to get your full-time place at Edinburgh College
Edinburgh College has last-minute places still available on a range of full-time courses across its curriculum until the application deadline this Friday (11th September).
Spaces are also available on a part-time, evening and leisure courses aimed at boosting and expanding professional skills or learning a new hobby.
The college’s courses offer routes to employment and further studies in specialities from hair and beauty and dance to childcare, science, construction, events management and engineering.
The college has full-time places across its curriculum:
- Community-based programmes including Entry to Learning and Preparation for Employment
- Creative Industries courses including dance, musical theatre, music and computing subjects including HND Computer Games Development
- Engineering programmes including electrical, manufacture, fabrication and welding, and the college’s BEng Energy and Environmental Engineering, delivered with Edinburgh Napier University
- Science courses including Scottish Wider Access Programme (SWAP) courses to prepare students for university study, and NC Higher Applied Science courses to develop practical laboratory skills
- Health, Wellbeing and Social Sciences courses including early education and childcare, and courses to prepare students for Higher studies
- Construction HND courses in construction management and architectural technology
- Hair and Beauty therapy
- Events management
Students get access to industry-standard resources, from specialist engineering facilities including renewable and sustainable technology to our arts rehearsal and performance spaces and theatres, and our hair and beauty salons.
The college’s Creative Industries Department is also holding a clearing day to provide more information on courses available for application. This will take place on Sighthill Campus (for Broadcast Media & Photography, Computing, Music & Sound Production) and Granton Campus (for Performing Arts and Art & Design) on Thursday 10 September, 1.30-6pm.
Part-time, evening and leisure courses are also available across the curriculum, including: languages; National 5, Higher and Advanced Higher; Engineering, including occupational health and safety; Business and finance including accounting, marketing, management and admin; creative courses in photography, art portfolio and computing; courses in hygiene and food standards; counselling and social care and medical and pharmacy courses.
For more information on the full-time courses with spaces, visit www.edinburghcollege.ac.uk/august15.
For part-time courses, visit www.edinburghcollege.ac.uk/august2015/pt.aspx