10th Anniversary Celebrations

Wow...what a great time we had on Friday night!

We were celebrating 10 years since the very first course ran at All Saints' Learning Centre. Back then, we were crammed into the front of school. All we had was a table and a filing cabinet.

In the last 10 years, we've had over 1000 people come through the door - that's 1 in 7 of the adult population of the town, which really isn't bad going at all. We've run loads of beginner courses and 18 European Computer Driving Licence courses.

To celebrate the occasion, we had a local artist, Jette Riedlin, produce the letters that you can see on the photograph on this blog. They look fantastic and really set off the building. We're going to try and keep them up for as long a we can to remind people that we've been around for a long time.

In March, we will be celebrating the fifth birthday of the building too. I like the way the building looks from the outside, though I know it's not everyone's cup of tea. However, the vast majority of people really love the inside of the building and find the peace and calm inside a relaxing place to learn.

I should also point out that Jocelyn has just celebrated 6 years as Centre Administrator and I started here 5 years ago. How time flies!

Andy

Why so long....?

What on earth have we been doing since January?

Good question.

You see this blog was supposed to be launched on our new website, which has been delayed until now for all sorts of different reasons. But don't worry. We're now back and motoring and the new website is going live in a couple of days time.

Happy New Year!

A happy new year to one and all. The festivities seem a long time ago now. This is the start of the second week back and we are as busy as usual. We have a number of courses starting this week. Some were delayed because Mary was unwell last week. It's always nice at the start of a new course to see how many people you recognise that have been through the centre before. It's nice to welcome people back as well as welcoming a few new faces.

This week we are trying to get our heads around some of the returns we have to make regarding our activities. With our First Time online sessions that we run courtesy of UK online, we have to report back a whole series of general details. We don't give them addresses or anything like that but they need to know how many people in, say, each age category there are. It's not easy to get all that information but, unfortunately, to get the money from UK online, we need to collate the information. There are also a series of returns that we need to do for Cumbria Adult Education Service that need to be done by the middle of February. It can be quite taxing at times but, thankfully, Jocelyn has in place a number of systems to make life easier. Phew!

As far as finances are concerned, we don't get a lump sum at the beginning of the year like, for example, a school does. We have to earn our money as we go. We receive an amount for every learner from the government for all our accredited courses. With our Easy courses, it's a little simpler. We only bring in what the learner pays. But unless we get learners coming through the door, we end up not being able to pay for things!!!

Thankfully, in the years since All Saints' Learning Centre started, we've made a small surplus each time and ploughed this back into the Centre's activities.

We have a Numeracy course that has just started on a Friday afternoon. This is for people who want to brush up on their maths. Lots of people would like to improve their maths and if you're one of them, let us know. We also have a family fitness course starting tonight in the school hall here at All Saints. After the Christmas rush, it will be nice to get rid of a few pounds. It's a course for parents and their primary age children.

So, that's enough for now - there's paperwork to be done. See you soon.

Happy Chistmas

Well, I'm writing this on the very last day of term. There are a few things we need to do - some information sending over to UK online etc. but it's pretty quite. There are no learners in the building just myself, Jocelyn and Kay McDonald preparing some work for next term.

I always find the last day before the Christmas holidays quite poignant. I go around and make sure that everything is switched off. I knock the lights off on the Christmas tree for the very last time, knowing that by the time we come back, it'll be time to take it down and pack it away for another year. I also take home all the cards that I've been sent and try to tidy my desk up - OK, at least I'll make an effort.

We had notification today that we didn't succeed in our bid for £100k from UK online, which is a shame. Funding of that size and variety doesn't come around too often. However, onwards and upwards as they say.

The Centre staff are all doing different things over Christmas. I'll be going down to Bolton on Christmas Day with my family and then travelling on to Witney near Oxford for New Year. I like Christmas - probably more so than my kids - and it's nice to have time off together.

Anyhow, best wishes to all of you for 2007. Have the best Christmas you can and, hopefully, we'll catch up with you in the new year.

Andy

Au revoir to Grant

After a number of years both tutoring and looking after our maintenance needs at the Centre, Grant has decided to move on. He's got a new job at Nelson Thomlinson School in Wigton. I'm sure many of you will have benefited from Grant's expertise in the past. In particular, he's been instrumental in the introduction of the easywindows and easydigital photography courses that have proved to be so popular in recent months. He's not going to disappear overnight and he'll be around tutoring for a few weeks yet.

On behalf of everyone, I wish Grant well in his new job. I'm sure he'll enjoy it but I'm equally sure he won't be a stranger to us in the future.

Andy

Hello and Welcome

This is the weekly blog from All Saints' Learning Centre.

What we're hoping to do here is to let you know some information about what's going on but also to show you what it's like trying to organise somewhere like All Saints' - how we work out what courses to run, how the latest government initiatives affect us, what's going on with some of the personalities at the Centre.

Hopefully, it'll be fun as well as you get to know us more.

This week, we're a little quieter as some courses have ended ahead of the Christmas holidays. It's a nice time of year. The tree is up and we receive lots of cards from learners and other people who we've met over the years.

We've put a bid in for money to UK online, one of the big organisations we work with. This is really exciting and if we receive the money it will lead to lots of further work for us. The way we work is changing. We're not only expected to help people to use computers and to develop their skills, we're also expected to get people to start to think about using all the services that are available online. This includes all the e-government services - both national and local. If you've never seen one of the government websites, then let us know and we'll get you on a course. Unless you can access some of these services in the future, you'll be disadvantaged.

So come on - take up the digital challenge.

Andy