Harrogate group win national award
Congratulations are due to students of the Ripon Project Group in Harrogate who have been recognised for their contribution to learning in this year's Adult Learners' Week.
Members of the group were presented with a Group Award as part of the annual campaign to celebrate adult learning which is run by the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE). The Yorkshire-based project which is run in partnership by Mind, the mental health charity and the WEA's Yorkshire and Humber Region, was nominated for an award by Helen Widdowson, WEA Tutor Organiser who works with the group in Harrogate and Ripon. Here she describes what the project is all about and why members of the group were so deserving of the award.
 The Ripon Project Group is a group of students with mental health problems who have all taken part in courses run at Harrogate Mind's Acorn Day Centre. Most of them started learning with the WEA at the Acorn Centre two or three years ago, when we instigated a joint Vocational, Education and Training (VET) Day at the centre on a Friday where people could come along specifically to take part in educational activities rather than use the centre as a drop-in social centre as it is the rest of the week.
Members of the group collect their award from Education Secretary, Ruth Kelly at this year's Adult Learners' Week awards ceremony.
Members of the group started on the WEA's New Directions course which is OCN accredited and aims (successfully!) to help people to move on in their life.
The course covers confidence building, assertiveness, communication skills, time management, stress management, using past experience to plan the future, exploring job, voluntary work and leisure activity opportunities, interview techniques and application writing. The course is not specifically designed for mental health groups but we have successfully used it in this context, as well as others, for some years.
Having completed their New Directions the students wanted to continue with something else and we developed a follow-on course to be based around a project with some tutor input, but with quite a lot of work to be taken on by members of the group.
Mind in Harrogate had wanted to look at the possibility of opening a satellite centre in the nearby town of Ripon and it was decided that the project should be based around this. The first thing the group needed to do was perform a feasibility study, and their tutor helped them to raise the money to do this by applying to charitable trusts.
They then designed and carried out the survey and established the needs of service users. They formed a committee to take the Project further and decided they needed to learn about committee skills - so commissioned a course from the WEA to give them these skills! They also needed to improve their computer skills and took advantage of the courses the WEA were running as a part of the VET day to do this.
They continued to follow through with their plan to open a new centre applying for more funds, writing letters to interested local groups, looking for suitable premises, lobbying Mind for the necessary support and in January 2005, the new Ripon Centre started opening two days a week staffed by members of the original group, some in a paid and some in a voluntary capacity. The WEA is again involved in the provision of learning opportunities, initially a Computer workshop and a New Directions Course, with a relaxing Tai Chi course to follow soon.
This group have worked hard and consistently to make this happen opening up new opportunities for people who like themselves suffer from on-going mental health problems. Some of the group have suffered from recurring problems that have meant hospitalisation, but nevertheless they have persevered and achieved their goal.
Three of the group are now in paid employment, two with MIND, and one in outside employment. One of the original course members has now taken over the tutoring of the Starting Over Course for the WEA at both the Acorn and Ripon Centres, as well as being employed by MIND as Assistant Centre Manager and is an inspiration to others joining the VET day courses.
It is difficult to use your mental health problems as an excuse for not trying something when you see what others can achieve despite their serious mental health problems.
Useful addresses (see below for links):
Workers' Educational Association
Yorkshire and Humber Region
6 Woodhouse Square
Leeds
LS3 1AD
Tel: 0113 245 3304
Mind
101 Station Parade
Harrogate
North Yorkshire
HG1 1HB
Tel: 01423 503335
NIACE
Renaissance House
20 Princess Road West
Leicester
LE1 6TP
Tel: 0116 204 4200
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