March 1, 2019

The Kickstart programme began working with Year 8 children in January 2019 across five secondary schools in the Barrow and Furness area. This is an expansion of two schools from last year with the addition of Dowdales School (Dalton in Furness) and Ulverston Victoria High School.

The programme designed to improve communication, confidence, leadership, resilience and teamwork, has been engaging with the schools through after-school provision.

The children have been involved in a poster campaign centred on health and wellbeing. They have sought advice from professionals at SAFA and also design expertise from Oxley Development Company marketing department to assist them in their campaign. The resulting posters cover topics such as cyber-bullying, stress, anxiety, and peer pressure and these posters will be distributed around the participating schools who will offer advice as to how to deal with these issues.

One of the highlights of the programme has been the half term trip to Kepplewray Outdoor Education Centre in Broughton–in–Furness, where the children had the opportunity to expand on the goals of the programme by participating in bush-craft, archery, crate stacking, and the giant tree climb.

The programme will culminate with an award ceremony at the Forum in Barrow on Friday 22 March 2019. The children and their families will be invited to attend this ceremony and watch a video of the half term trip.
Inspector Jim Bailey from Cumbria Constabulary will be the guest speaker and will present special awards.