GFTU BGCM 2019 Minutes

next step. We have been working with Colin at GMB and lots of other unions

around the trailblazer for the trade union standard and we were there right at

the start and are still in that with the GFTU and that has been a fantastic

enterprise and a real step forward for the college. This is what I mean in terms

of what do we do next. We need to do different things. We are on the cusp of

delivering a leadership programme for the GMB, leadership and management

at level 5 in their West Midlands constituency region and again that is an

exciting endeavour for the college, but it is about us, through necessity, having

to do different things, but coming up with better things as well.

So I will now move over to Nicky and Nicky can tell you more so about the

experience of the students.

NICOLA O’SHEA: Thank you. I am sure at half past four in the afternoon no one

wants to know that there is a Business Development Manager with slides, so I

will keep it really quick. (Laughter) Fortunately, most of them are pictures and

some stories as well. I am sure most people in the room have some

knowledge, probably great knowledge, of Ruskin. Ruskin’s past is very well

documented. I think what is more difficult to really understand is what its

present and its future is. I am sure if I say I am going to tell you some stories

you will be expecting me to tell some of these stories of these amazing people

that have come through the college in the past, but actually today I want to talk

to you about some of the students that we have right now and some of the

things that we are doing. There are so many different strands to what we are

doing. I have focused today on Access, our Access programme, which is

growing year on year. It is extremely successful. A one year level 3

programme, Access to Higher Education.

But before we even get to that, we are based in Oxford. I do not know how

many of you are aware of Oxford. The recent report from the Social Mobility

Commission was very damning across the country, but I think Oxford is an

example of exactly the worst of all of this. We have this beautiful city, we have

the most unaffordable housing in the country, we have one of the highest levels

of homelessness and within that framework Ruskin is doing some really, really

important work. Obviously, our reach is also national and international, but

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