Site map << You are here: Home » Themes » Learning & Skills » Culture and learning » Slough Creative Academy » Slough Creative Academy

Slough Creative Academy

Alison Hibbert, Cultural Strategy and Operations Manager at Slough Borough Council, writes:

With the highest black and minority ethnic population outside of London - at 41per cent - over 50 languages spoken as a first language,and high levels of new arrivals and asylum seekers from more than 70 different countries, Slough is a rich mixture of culturally diverse communities.

Background
Slough is an urban area of just 32,55km in the east of Berkshire and is
geographically one of the smallest unitary authorities in the UK. Excellent transport
and communication links account for its importance, growth and success as a
commercial centre. It is home to the largest, privately owned trading estate in
Europe. And it has a population in excess of 121,200 people, an increase of 14 per
cent since the last census and well above the average rate of growth nationally.

However, despite the town’s prosperity, some areas of Slough do not share in the
town’s wealth. Slough contains some of the poorest people in the South East region
with some of the highest rates of poverty in the UK. Three of its 14 wards appear
as the most-deprived in the region due to the prevalence of low income, high
crime, inferior housing and poor health. A child born in Slough today has a three
year shorter life expectancy than that of a child born 12 miles west, in Wokingham.
Slough also has the highest rates of poor literacy and numeracy in the region. Since
1995, 7,000 jobs have been lost in the manufacturing sector but service sector jobs
have grown by 9,500. Settled families originally moved to Slough for manual and
semi-skilled work. Their children and grandchildren now need the skills required by
the service and hi-tech sectors. Much work is being undertaken to address this
acute skills mismatch between the town’s resident population and the businesses
that are located here.

What the Academy did

In response to the demand for skills in the creative industries, Slough Creative
Academy, a partnership of creative training providers, agencies and businesses, was
launched in November 2003.
The Academy provides the strategic framework and administrative infrastructure to
support and develop further growth in the creative industries. It does so by
developing networks of opportunity and learning and providing continuous and
focused investment in creative skills. In particular, it aims to target and address the
lack of female and black and minority creatives in employment in the industry.
The Academy has developed a close working relationship with the community. It has
also been instrumental in bringing all of Slough’s creative agencies and organisations
together; creating a key partnership, which now has a co-ordinated approach to the
delivery of training and skills opportunities across the town and in neighbouring
authorities.

Partners include: East Berkshire College, Slough Young People’s Centre, Thames
Valley University (including Reading College of Art & Design), Slough Creative
Partnerships (Arts Council), Amersham and Wycombe College, Fusion Dance
Company, Resource Productions, Paperknife Productions, Slough Borough Council
(Arts Development, Library Service, Slough Services for Young People), Slough
Enterprise Hub (SEEDA), Music4Slough (Youth Music).

Key Areas

Over the two years the Academy has been established it has prioritised the
following key areas:

• Work with the creative industry sectors to identify the skills needed
• Work with further and higher education to plug the identified gaps in learning and
  training provision, which is industry endorsed
• Identify work placements, work experience and mentoring opportunities with
  industry
• Offer showcasing opportunities for the marketing and selling of local talent so
  that people can earn a living, make money or set up a business
• Create a one-stop-shop for career and business advice in creative industries
• Pilot with industry appropriate modern apprenticeships in the creative industries
  at sub-sector level (dance, music, film & TV)

The Creative Academy has successfully secured European Social Fund money to
ensure its current programme, operates up to the end of 2007. The Academy is also
actively working in conjunction with both its national and European partners in
developing a central e-commerce/directory platform, which is designed to extend
the market reach of minority creatives, like an ‘E-Bay’ for minority talent.

To date the Academy has had over 5,000 people through its programmes, has
achieved over 400 vocational qualifications for its participants, has created five
social enterprises and supported large numbers of young businesses to get
established.

Through its work placement programme 10 young dancers have
recently been given the opportunity to train with the acclaimed Rambert Dance
Company and performed in Helsinki in July. In June 2006, 10 local creatives
travelled to Rotterdam for two months, to assist in the filming and production of an
international feature film staring James Gandolfini.

The Academy hosted the first ‘Urban Action’ festival in July 2006 in Slough, celebrating
and showcasing local young talent, through dance, mcing, music and street sports.
The event aimed to attract an audience of 10,000 and hosted BananaJam, the
national B-boy 2 on 2 battle. The Academy has also been asked to organise the
opening ceremony celebrations and artistic content for this year’s World Rowing
Championships at the Olympic rowing venue at Dorney Lake, Eton. This event was
televised by the BBC worldwide and was a once in a lifetime opportunity for
Slough’s creative community to showcase its talents on an international platform.

copyright © 2008 Southeast Cultural Observatory