What can be learned from this project?
• Mentors and project managers are involved in ongoing community engagement activity, visiting schools and community centres to talk about the project, gather feedback and identify individuals who could be helped. Recruitment for training programmes is carried out through word of mouth and direct engagement with the community, rather than through traditional forms of advertising in newspapers or in Jobcentres.
• Mentors are recruited from the local community and participants are always paired with a mentor who understands the cultural and social pressures that they face. Some programme participants have gone on to become mentors. The mentoring relationship continues after the initial period of training, with the mentor helping the trainee to settle into employment and ensuring that the expectations of both the trainee and the employer are being met.
• The Youthbuild project acquired council properties that were hard to let and used the trainees to make improvements to the properties. Rental income from the properties was then used to fund further training programmes.
Successful trainees at work
• Accent’s model for local skills development can be applied in different markets and in different parts of the country. Accent is working with partners in Burnley, Stockton and London to implement programmes to address skills issues within other communities and the National Housing Federation and the Learning and Skills Council have funded Accent to disseminate best practice across the Yorkshire and Humber region.
Topics associated with this project
Community engagement, Education, Housing, Partnership working, Training