About the Youth Access Project

Fun learning

The Youth Access project provides fun learning experiences for young people in the Greater Easterhouse Area. This is based on the opportunities arising from the Greater Easterhouse Learning Network and three dedicated youth workers.

The Youth Access project is:

• engaging with young people through the use of computers - in particular games, music production and creating websites;
• enabling youth groups and organizations to commission the services that specifically suit them;
• delivering its services from Greater Easterhouse Learning Centres;
• giving support based on existing structures and working relationships;
• helping to deliver additional services cost-effectively.

The Youth Access project also builds local community capacity together with John Wheatley College. Training is provided for volunters and staff in the ICT skils thay need to support informal learning across the GELN.

The College provides (with funding through its Wider Access budget) similar upskilling for volunteer youth workers and existing youth services workers

Aims:

• To exploit the development of the Greater Easterhouse Learning Network (GELN) in support of the Partnership’s aspirations for the development of youth services.
• To bring together a combination of network resources including youth workers and college tutors to provide a range of opportunities for young people across the GELN.
• To provide a commissioning budget available to youth groups (along the lines of John Wheatley College’s Wider Access programme) that will allow them to “purchase” the activities they identify a need for at a time and place that suits them.

Objectives:

To provide a range of activities for young people, including:

• ‘Homework High’ – supported access to Internet and word processing resources to assist young people in the completion of ‘homework’ related tasks
• support for website creation – linked to opportunities for certification as well to develop skills in communication, photography and design
• music creation flexible learning with CD and web publishing options. Music activities would include inter-neighbourhood forums for exchange of files and leads to samples etc based on common taste shared across geographical boundaries
• internet and email support including use of safe chat system environment (requiring registration and ID confirmation)
• part-time flexible learning opportunities for traditional college provision (business applications and general introduction to ICT)
• multi-player games including development of local leagues as appropriate (developing interpersonal and organizational skills as well as those related to use of ICT).

Partners

Youth Access will also build local community capacity. The College has recognized, in its work with adult learners, the need to provide training for volunteers and other staff in the ICT skills needed to support informal learning across the GELN. The College would propose to provide (with funding through its Wider Access budget) similar upskilling for volunteer youth workers and existing youth services workers.

The Youth Access project works within the context of Greater Easterhouse’s Youth Network. It works with existing youth-based learning centres such as those hosted by Family Action in Rogerfield and Easterhouse and the Pavilion youth club. More widely, it works in other learning centres in partnership with the Youth Involvement Project and Glasgow City Council’s Youth Services. As part of the Greater Easterhouse Learning Network, it has an inclusive approach to practical partnerships.

Management

The Youth Access project is managed on a day to day basis within the Greater Easterhouse Learning Network (contact: Craig Green) and reports to the Greater Easterhouse Social Inclusion Partnership’s Education and Lifelong Working Group (chaired by Alan Inglis, Assistant Principal at John Wheatley College).

The project is managed at strategic level by a Steering Group, also chaired by Alan Inglis, whose members are:

• Alan Inglis Assistant Principal, John Wheatley College (Chair)
• Craig Green Information and Learning Services Manager, John Wheatley College
• Maggie Murphy GCC Youth Services
• Rosemary Dickson Family Action in Rogerfield and Easterhouse
• Aileen Brown Glasgow Community Planning Partnership

Funding

The project is funded by Glasgow Community Planning Partnership.