Agenda item

Councillors are reminded that they will need to declare any interest they may have in budget applications, and/or indicate that Section 106 of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 applies to them.

The following funding application has been received:

Personal Development Courses for local community residents to enable them to access and undertake volunteer work as a stepping stone back into employment aiding addressing community cohesion.

(Joint bid to Belgrave and Latimer, Rushey Mead and Spinney Hill Wards).

Submitted by: North Neighbourhood Sure Start Children’s Centres

Amount requested: £2888 per Ward.

Information as submitted by the applicant:

We are requesting the funding to enable delivery of a range of Personal Development Courses which will include confidence building, assertiveness and stress management to a wide range of local potential volunteer learners at the three Sure Start Children’s centre’s within the North Neighbourhood area.  The 3 centres are:

·         Woodbridge, 54a, Woodbridge Road (Rushey Mead Ward)

·         Belgrave, Cossington Street (Belgrave & Latimer Ward)

·         St Matthew’s,34 Vancouver Road (Spinney Hill Ward)

The courses will be 6 weeks long and 3 hours in length for a Maximum of 15 students. The room hire for the crèche and training will provided free of charge by the individual Sure Start Children’s Centre.

We would like to begin running the courses in the autumn of 2012 (September if possible).

The course has been piloted by Sure Start North Neighbourhood Community Development team and was very successful. However capacity within Community Development team will be reduced in the next few months making it impossible to carry out any more courses of this nature.  However the need for the course has increased and the centres were inundated with referrals from the local neighbourhoods as well as citywide.  We will however only be offering this course to our own local residents with the postcodes within each centre’s boundary.  There are no similar courses within the area being offered.

The course will meet many of the Community Cohesion based on the pilot course outcomes which includes:

Bringing different communities together.

The attendee’s on the course were from a wide range of different ethnicities, different cultures and different languages are spoken. Whilst attending the course students began to gain an understanding of each other’s backgrounds, cultures and perceptions began to change about stero-types that students had held about different cultures.  In turn friendships were formed which would not have occurred without the facilitation of the course.  Breaking down any preconceived stereo-types will automatically have a positive impact upon communities and within families.  Making areas more harmonious and better places to live and work.

New Communities Bond Together

The course helped new communities to grow together and develop a self-help system – Students on the courses have often felt very isolated in their lives due to language and employment issues as well as mental and physical health issues.  By attending the course a sense of belonging emerged and students were really encourage to support each other both in and out of the classroom, giving empathy and a non-judgemental approach to others in particular those new to living in the area.  We would also encourage a Personal Development “self-help” group to form in its own entity and continue the work of the tutor.  This group may become constituted through help from an organisation such as VAL.

Course Content

The course will cover confidence building, assertiveness and stress management.  Via the learner’s evaluation of the course and them providing excellent feedback it was evident the pilot course proved extremely popular. 

Please see below some examples of the impact the course had on the children / young people and their parents / carers due to accessing the pilot course from 26.6.2012.to 21.8.2012. Also direct feedback / comments we received from students themselves on evaluation and during the course:

• “The course has really helped me to become more assertive especially with my children”
• “The stress management was really great and the meditation was excellent”
• “My confidence has grown during the course I would like to do the course again at another time”. 

See attached course content and poster.

Referrals

Referrals come from a wide range of different agencies including family support, health visitors, existing volunteers, local community centre’s etc.

The course was extremely oversubscribed and a waiting list has been kept in order to help with further recruitment. The Sure Start centres will take responsibility for recruitment of the students.

Every Child Matter’s (ECM’s)

The courses will contribute to the 5 areas of the ECM which are – ‘Be Healthy’, ‘Enjoy and Achieve’, ‘Stay Safe’, ‘Make a Positive Contribution’ and ‘Achieve Economic Wellbeing’.  Many of our parents on the course are lonely, isolated, depressed; have a mental or physical illness and literacy levels are low.  However in the long term many are looking to gain employment by participating on the course they will feel more confident to move forward into other training, additional volunteering, employment or other types of educational activities.

At the present there are no courses even similar to this being run at local Further Education (FE) colleges due to national budget cuts for non- vocational courses. There are very few referral pathways for people suffering with low confidence and this course is an identified gap in provision. 

Evaluation 

We will evaluate the course at the end of the six week course using a simple evaluation making it accessible to anyone who’s English is not their first language.  The evaluation will be used to improve future courses.

Tracking Students Progress (post course completion)

From the pilot course it was evident to ensure best results and continued support that we include in future courses:

• Contact after 3 months of course completion
• Contact after 6 months of course completion
• Contact after 12 months of course completion with an invitation to bring the group back together for mutual support and encouragement

This will enable us to support, track their progress and offer appropriate support when required as well as helping shape future courses.

The Chair explained that three funding applications had been submitted as follows:

PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT COURSE FOR LOCAL COMMUNITY RESIDENTS

Submitted by the North Neighbourhood Sure Start Children’s Centres.

Amount requested: £2888 per Ward (funding also requested from Belgrave and Latimer Ward and Spinney Hill Ward.

The Chair added that a decision was being deferred on this application as further information was sought to ascertain whether this course was already being offered elsewhere.

RESOLVED:

that the funding application for a Personal Development Course for local community residents be deferred pending further information.

ARCHER CLOSE GRASS VERGE PROTECTION

Submitted by: Mike Pears Team Leader Highway Asset Management, Leicester City Council

Amount requested: £4,000

Funding was requested for the repair of the grass verge outside 9 Archer Close and for the installation of knee rails around grass verges outside 5 & 7, 9 & 11 and 13 Archer Close.

The Chair explained that Councillors had agreed to defer this application as a request had been submitted to the City Council to fund this work from the central budget.

RESOLVED:

that the application be deferred to ascertain whether the work could be funded from the City Council’s central budget.

GOLDEN MILE SHOPPING FESTIVAL 2012

Submitted by the Belgrave Business Association

Amount requested: £500

Funding was requested towards brochures to support the Golden Mile Shopping Festival which was planned to take place in November. The festival would bring existing sweet / grocery shops, jewellery shops etc substantial exposure attracting new and wider audiences to the Golden Mile. It was hoped to help increase and establish the Golden Mile Shopping Festival as a highlight of the City’s event calendar.

The Chair explained that the Ward Councillors would not support this funding application as they agreed that Ward Community Meeting funding should not be used for this purpose.

RESOLVED:

                        that the funding application be unsupported.