North Lanarkshire Council Report
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NORTH LANARKSHIRE COUNCIL REPORT To: LEARNING AND LEISURE SERVICES Subject: Service Highlights Date:24 July 2010 Ref: JF/LC 1.O INTRODUCTION The purpose of this report is to provide the Learning and Leisure Services Committee with information on recent service highlights. 2.0 RECOMMENDATION The Learning and Leisure Services Committee is recommended to note the content of this report. Members seeking further information are asked to contact: - Christine Pollock, Executive Director on 01698 302534 Lizanne McMurrich, Head of Community Information and Learning on 01236 812338 302 NORTH LANARKSHIRE COUNCIL - LEARNING AND LEISURE SERVICES SERVICE HIGHLIGHTS Report by Executive Director 1 .O INTRODUCTION The purpose of this report is to provide the Learning and Leisure Services Committee with information on recent service highlights. 2.0 CONS IDE RATIONS 2.1 International Children’s Games Success Team Lanarkshire struck gold on the final day of the International Children’s Games in Manama, Bahrain, and will return to Scotland with their best-ever haul of medals. In the football, the boys disposed of Soprom of Hungary in the quarter-final, winning 6-0, before facing Baghdad in the semi-final. Winning this match 3-2 took the boys through to face host city Manama in the final. An own goal and several on target strikes made sure of a 5-1 win and the gold medal. In athletics, the girls won silver in the 4xIOOm relay while the boys took bronze in their relay. Silver was won in the long jump and a bronze in the long ump. On the last day of the sailing in the Arabian Gulf, Team Lanarkshire secured 10‘L place overall. That all meant a fantastic haul of nine medals for the team in genuinely testing conditions where temperatures soared as high as 44 degrees. The International Children’s Games sees 1500 athletes aged 15 and under from around the world compete for medals. Lanarkshire will host ICG 201 1 in August next year. 2.2 Creative Residencv Ptonramme, Kilbowie, 2010 North Lanarkshire Creative Residency offers an inspirational opportunity to senior pupils studying Art & Design and Music in schools across North Lanarkshire at a crucial time in their creative life and artistic development. This year’s Residency was held from 21-25 June at the Kilbowie Outdoor Centre near Oban where a group of S5 pupils had the opportunity to work both outdoors as well as within a studio environment. As part of the 2010 programme, each pupil chose an area of specialist elective study, which this year included Visual Arts and Curatorship, Jewellery, Musical Composition, Digital Photography, Film Making, Printed Textiles/Fashion and Graphic Design. This programme was directed and mentored by staff, drawn from within many facets of Learning and Leisure Services in North Lanarkshire Council, together with external Arts specialists and partners of national and international reputation. These included staff from Heriot-Watt University and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. The specialist tutors provide both direction and support to the extensive range of creative opportunities afforded by the Residency. This engagement with pupils is seen as being one side of a ‘Learning Agreement’ within which pupils are expected to respond positively, rise to the challenge and make a full commitment to the programme for the duration of the week. The rewards for all can be significant. As an extension to the Creative Residency Programme, a series of Master-classes will follow in September. The Textiles Master-class is funded and supported by the School of 303 Design and Textiles at Heriot-Watt University and held at their Galashiels campus. The Musical Composition Master-class is supported by The Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama at their Glasgow campus. The Film 8, Digital Photography Master- class will be conducted at the Council’s state of the art Photo-Media Studio at Summerlee, Museum of Scottish Industrial Life in Coatbridge. The Creative Residency will culminate with an exhibitiodevent at Summerlee Museum from 19-26 November 2010. 2.3 Kilbowie Outdoor Centre During the 2009-2010 Session, 132 North Lanarkshire primary, secondary and special schools had groups attending Kilbowie. Of these 119 were primary P7 classes on 4 or 5 day courses. Once again Kilbowie has increased the provision to Council P7 pupils, our core service users. 4168 places were offered to primaries last year with an uptake of 87% giving 3662 pupils attending. The majority of schools not attending were organising foreign trips or their P7 pupils had attended last year as P6. A new pontoon slipway will be installed in August which will link to the access path from the centre to the shore. This will greatly improve access to canoes and boats for all. The design is fully accessible for wheelchair users and we anticipate more users to take advantage of our full access facilities. 2.4 Monument Fellowship Funding - Museum Success North Lanarkshire’s curatorial team have obtained 70% funding under the Museums Association’s Monument Fellowship Scheme to employ former engineer and curator Dan Mackay MBE for 50 days to examine the Industrial History Collection at Summerlee, which he was instrumental in developing, and to record his knowledge about the collections and the industries and firms associated with them. Dan will work with the Curatorial staff to develop their knowledge and help them improve the documentation of the collection. The project will tie-in with a full review of the nationally significant Industrial History Collection. It will enable the service to better target resources for the care and interpretation of the collection, prioritise areas for rationalisation and identify gaps in the collection. A key outcome will be an archive of information which can be made available via online access to the collections database. 2.5 Duke of Edinburgh Awards On Friday 16 July the Gold Awards Ceremony for the Duke of Edinburgh Award was held at Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh. The extremely prestigious award was presented to five young people from the North Lanarkshire area. North Lanarkshire received more gold award certificates than any other local authority or voluntary organisation. The Duke of Edinburgh was present during the special day as well as special guests, workers and friends and family of the awardees. The Duke of Edinburgh spent a great deal of time with the young people discussing the award and the different activities that they were involved in for each section. The reward recognises the achievements of the young people and their dedication and commitment to the award. 2.6 Play Area Openinns Six new play facilities were officially opened during the school holiday programme of play activities. The three new play areas, funded by the local development programme (LDP), were at Redmire Crescent, Allanton (f40K), Doon Street, Flemington (f40K) and Beechwood Crescent, Greenend (f60K). Two new multi-use games areas at Central Park and next to the community centre off Crowhill Road, Rochsoles, in Airdrie were funded through LDP (f82K and f45K respectively) with additional WREN (f50K) 304 and Community Safety Partnership (f5K) grant funding to Rochsoles Community Resource Project for Rochsoles. A skate park facility in West End Park, Coatbridge, increasing the range of play facilities, was also funded through the LDP (f48,700). The official opening of the refurbished Interplay major play area in Drumpellier Country Park (f160K from the L&L capital programme) was postponed awaiting replacement swing seats after the theft of four swing seats, at a cost of f2,500. 2.7 Primary Games June 2010 Around 2,800 children from primary schools in North Lanarkshire took part in the sixth annual North Lanarkshire Council’s primary games at Wishaw Sports Centre. They competed in sports including athletics, basketball, badminton, boccia, football, rugby, netball, golf, tennis and judo. The Primary Games is a unique event providing primary pupils the opportunity to participate in a multi sport Olympic style event, creating an atmosphere of fun and celebration. Over the two day event we hope to inspire pupils to continue to participate in physical activity and sport and to encourage many to go on to become the athletes of the future, competing in forthcoming Children’s, Olympic and Commonwealth Games. The games are committed to providing a positive environment for participation with an opportunity for our young athletes to experience healthy competition. The two day event included a participation event for P4/5 and a competitive event for pupils in P6/7. Over the two days pupils were introduced and encouraged to adopt many of the Olympic values including friendship, excellence, respect, determination and courage. 2.8 Celebration of Learnina Awards 2010 The Celebration of Learning Awards took place in May. Groups and individuals from all over North Lanarkshire were represented and received certificates in recognition of their outstanding achievements in learning. The event, with 320 people attending, commenced with an introduction by Martin McGuire, Principal of Cumbernauld College and chair of the North Lanarkshire Community Learning and Development Partnership and a welcome from Councillor Tom Curley, Provost of North Lanarkshire, followed by a cabaret during dinner, performed by students of Coatbridge College. Provost Curley and Martin McGuire then presented the award certificates, together with representatives from award sponsors and nominators. They were joined on stage for North Lanarkshire’s Working Awards by Maureen McConachie, Head of Regeneration Services at North Lanarkshire Council. After the awards ceremony Craig Brown CBE Manager of Motherwell Football Club, was an excellent guest speaker. Lizanne McMurrich, Head of Community Information and Learning, gave a vote of thanks to the learners and special guests. 2.9 Communitv Wellbeing in Fornewood As a result of funding from the Scottish Government (f25,OOO) and Motherwell and District Local Partnership Development Programme (f30,000), North Lanarkshire Partnership established a Participatory Budgeting scheme aimed at developing a Community Wellbeing Initiative, focused upon tackling anti-social behaviour in the Forgewood area of Motherwell.