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Inside this month Learner Voice Holocaust Memorial Service Involuntary Emotion Sport Report

Gloucestershire College Student Magazine Jan 2013 Issue 3

Gloscol students feature in local artist’s new exhibition The Gazelle Colleges Group and Pants To Poverty Present The PantrepreneurSHIPHAVE YOU GOT ChallengeWHAT IT TAKES?

An opportunity to work on a 'real' business project and enhance, demonstrate your business planning, design, sales and marketingGLOUCESTERSHIRE skills. COLLEGE PANTS TO POVERTY TEAM Do you have what it takes to win the PantrepreneurSHIP Challenge?

Get a brief from your tutor today to be in with a chance of winning top drawer prizes including a lifetime trip to India 3RD IN THE UK 2012

DO YOU WANT A NEW CHALLENGE? ARE YOU A BUDDING ENTREPRENEUR? DO YOU WANT TO BE PART OF AN EXCITING AND DYNAMIC TEAM?

If you answered YES to all of the above

email [email protected] by Monday 4th February 2013 Contents Having a voice January 2013 Issue 3 You’ve recently been taking part in the Learner Voice feedback process so we thought we’d share with you 4 - New campus plans the themes and also the responses from the members of staff responsible for the areas you’ve mentioned. 5 - Holocaust Memorial Day It’s your college and your views can help shape it so please make sure that you speak up!

6-8 - Learner voice With that in mind turn to page 4 to see the latest news on the proposed plans for the new campus in the 10 - Art exhibition Forest of Dean. The architects have been appointed now and have some initial plans, which they would love you to not only have a look at but tell them what you 11 - Sport Report think of them.

Every January sees Holocaust Memorial Day, which gives a voice to those who were silenced by hatred. As part of the memorial service the Kaddish is read - it is the traditional Jewish prayer of mourning, normally recited by family members. For those killed in the Social networks Like us on Facebook: Nazi Holocaust, there was no one to give voice to www.facebook.com/ the prayer. The Holocaust Memorial Day is also gloucestershirecollege about giving a voice to those who are still suffering persecution, torture and death because of their beliefs, Follow us on Twitter: @ gloscol politics or race. See more on page 5.

They say a picture paints a thousand words, so turn to

View our videos online: page 10 to see some extraordinary paintings by local www.youtube.com/gloscol1 artist Russell Haines. The distinctive work captures the emotions of some of our KS4 students, who were then invited to describe the feelings behind the paintings. See our latest photos www.flickr.com/gloscol You can head along to the exhibition at Museum in February - see page 10 for the details.

If you would like to comment A voice is a human gift; it should be “ cherished and used, to utter fully on anything in the hub, or would like to contribute an human speech as possible. Powerlessness article or photo please email and silence go together. Janine at [email protected], or drop into one of the YES Margaret Atwood ” offices at Chelt or Glos or Poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, and environmental activist. Student Services at RFD The Fox Vox 3 Architect appointed for new Forest Campus

Gloucestershire College has appointed an Robert Limbrick has recently worked on Gloucester Academy architect for the brand new Forest of Dean campus.

The new campus is to be based at Cinderford’s Northern Quarter.

Gloucester-based Roberts Limbrick Architects will develop the plans for “an exemplar sustainable college campus”.

Roberts Limbrick has previously worked with Gloucestershire College on plans for Launchpad College in Tewkesbury and more recently on the Gloucester Academy.

Over the next three months, the team at Roberts Limbrick, led by Director, Joe Roberts, will work closely with the college’s internal and external stakeholders in the Forest of Dean to design a new campus.

The designs will include a separate independent sixth form, jointly run by Gloucestershire College and , alongside a shared social ‘hub’ and a vocational Gloucestershire College Royal Forest of Dean (RFD) Campus building.

Lynne Craig, site principal at Five Acres, said: “The appointment of Roberts Limbrick Architects means that we can now begin to realise our vision for a fantastic modern FE learning environment in the Forest of Dean”

Robert Limbrick would like to hear from you!

Joe Roberts, who is leading this stage of the new campus project, will be here with his colleague to talk to students, to gather ideas and opinion, and to showcase the initial drawings of the new campus, which is currently due to open in September 2015.

Monday 4th February, 11am - 2pm Gloucester Campus, Reception area

Tuesday 5th February, 11am - 2pm RFD Campus, Canteen area

Please go along and have a look at the plans and let the team know what you think, and what you would like to see.

4 Holocaust Memorial Day

Every year on 27th January, the world marks Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD).

Holocaust Memorial Day provides an opportunity for everyone to learn lessons from the Holocaust, Nazi persecution and subsequent genocides and apply them to the present day to create a safer, better future. On HMD we share the memory of the millions who have been murdered in the Holocaust and subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur in order to challenge hatred and persecution in the UK today.

The theme for 2013 is Communities Together: Build a Bridge, encouraging groups and individuals to come together and consider how neighbours have turned on each other, and challenges us to build stronger and more tolerant communities

As well as pausing to remember the victims of holocaust, this year’s theme encourages you to imagine what it would be like to find out one morning that you, yourself, were suddenly declared a non-person and stripped of all rights. Imagine yourself in this position and then think of others who genuinely are. What bridge will you build to help them?.

Hannah Parnell and Tyler O’Brien from the Students’ Union will be attending the service, which this year will be held at . As with last year, when The hosted the event, in remembrance of all the victims of the Holocaust and other genocides throughout the world, there will be reading of the Jewish prayer the “Kaddish” followed by a minutes’ silence.

Gloucestershire College libraries will also be commemorating the event, so if you would like more information head along to your campus library. It is hard to understand the scale of the horror of the Holocaust in Nazi Germany. Official figures are hard to pin down but it is estimated that the following people died:

•Jews- 5.9 million •Soviet POW’s- 3.3 million •Non-Jewish Poles- 1.8-2 million •Romanis (‘gypsies’)- 220,000- 270,000 (but even the higher figure may be too low) •Disabled- 200,000 - 250,000 •Homosexuals- 5,000 - 15,000 •Jehovahs Witnesses- 2,500 - 5,000

Men, women and children were exterminated because they didn’t fit the ideal 5 What was the feedback from the Learner Voice?

What is the Leaner Voice? You’ll already be familiar with the Learner Voice at Gloucestershire College, and will have taken part in the recent round of feedback which took place during the week of 15th October. The Learner Voice is one of the most valuable and effective tools you have for feeding back your views, concerns, questions and suggestions about life at college. The information you give really brings about positive change, so read on to find out what the college did about the issues that you raised to improve your experience

What were the areas looked at? The main questions you were asked in October were based around • The positives • Equality and Diversity and Respect • Favourite lesson so far and why • Safeguarding • Support Services • Other • Learning environment and resources What’s the process? Your personal tutor gathers the feedback from you. The Students’ Union then collate the main themes into two reports. One report goes to each of the curriculum (or teaching) areas with your comments and suggestions for change. The Head of School and Course Leaders will then let you know what changes will happen as a result of what you’ve said (‘you said, we did’). The other report is the ‘Cross College’ report and covers things that are outside of your lesson - so things like the food, the buildings, the libraries, Student Services and so on. Every term that report goes to a group of staff who are responsible for those support areas and facilities.

So, what was the feedback? What were the good things? It great to hear that so many of you are feeling so positive about your experience at GC! Have a look at this: • You feel safe in college at all campuses • You’re enjoying practical work, the trips and are finding tutorials useful • At the RFD campus you gave great feedback about the staff, facilities and food quality - you like the new seating area in the canteen (so please look after it!) • Again, at the Forest campus you’re happy with Student Services and the support for learners • Health and Social Care and Early Years students have commented on an improvement in teaching and learning from last year • You’re all saying you love the Macs that are appearing around college sites • Overwhelmingly you have enjoyed making friends, the staff are easy to get on with, there is respect between staff and students and you know that your opinions matter. You also feel happy that you know who to speak to if you have a problem 6 What about the things we would like to see improved?

The campuses • Across all campuses you felt classrooms were drab and boring. You also felt social spaces lack colour and inspiration too Sue Steed, Executive Director of Curriculum said: Thank you for this and actually we agree with you, staff have told us the same thing. A group of staff are currently running a project through the ‘big ideas lab’ to redesign some of the social spaces and corridors. We will then roll these ideas out to the classrooms. However there is nothing stopping students from asking to have their work on display in classrooms, or feeding back to your head of school about what you would like to see. You can also email [email protected] if you have any ideas you would like to share with us, we would love to hear them

Student Services • You appreciate the help with bursaries, and find the support from Student Services very useful, but you say you have to wait too long, especially at Gloucester. At break times you often only have 15 – 20 mins and this is when student services are busy but there are not enough staff on. • Students at Mitcheldean felt that they should have a student services section at the centre

Fiona Court, Admissions Manager Thank you for the feedback, we have been working hard to improve the customer experience. We will investigate whether between 10 – 11 we can have all our staff available, rather than just some of them. Please appreciate that we still need to answer and make calls at times and whilst we are not ‘serving face to face’ we are dealing with customers on the telephone. We will be putting up signs showing our average waiting times and alternative ways to contact us. Students at Mitcheldean, should be able to do most things they need to over the telephone now; however there will be occasional times when they have to come onto the main campus. Please speak to your personal tutor if you are having difficulties and need some support with this.

Catering • You questioned the pricing of some of the food in the canteens, and also commented on the quality: too much mayonnaise!

Anne Picknell, Catering Manager Thank you for the feedback, we’re glad you like the food and facilities at RFD. The prices are at present different, as when we merged the catering facilities at RFD were much cheaper. We increased them, but felt to increase them in line with Glos and Chelt was too much of a price hike in one go, so we have done it gradually and in the near future the campuses will be in line with each other. A new sandwich tendor has just gone out, and we will be taking your comments on board when making our decisions for a new improved range in January 2013. Please note that the Cheltenham dining room is now run by the catering students. Healthy food will always be more expensive than other food, and this is evident in supermarkets also. We have introduced the pasta pronto stand and this has been successful and priced competitively. Please tell us specifically what you would like. 7 IT Support • You find the laptop trollies are really annoying as many of the batteries aren’t charged and they are slow. You’ve also said that computers are slow (although you love the Macs!)

Mark Hanks, IT Support: MAC Specialist We’re glad you’re enjoying the Macs, please treat the equipment with respect and feedback to IT support if there are any issues with equipment. We have taken your feedback on board regarding the Laptop trolleys and have been working with timetables in order to utilise this equipment in a more reliable way. For example, setting up the laptops permanently in a classroom so they always have connection to power and data. We are aware of some computers running slower than others, we are currently carrying out a replacement programme to remove underperforming computers from the college. We are striving to secure more funding to speed up this process. It is also worth mentioning that IT Support are currently running a Virtualisation Desktop project that allows access to Window 7, this will improve the student experience . Please feel free to contact IT Support for further information. In the meantime it would be really useful for students to advise IT Support when the computers are running slowly and which room they are in. Please make a note of the room number, site, and if possible the asset number on the PC, that way we can check the machine. Attending to any faults is our top priority throughout the day, e.g. if there are 20 learners in a classroom and 3 PC’s don’t work, our priority is to attend immediately.

Equality and Diversity and Respect • You’ve been telling us what a positive experience you have had at college so far. Overwhelmingly you’re saying that you’ve enjoyed making friends, the staff are easy to get along with, there is respect between staff and students and that you’re opinions matter. You also know who to go to if there is a problem Sam Trickey, Head of Tutorials: Thank you for your feedback, we’re glad your experience has been positive, and that you are making friends. The staff work hard to forge strong relationships with students built on mutual trust and respect. We greatly value your opinions which is why learner voice is so important so you can tell us what we do well, and what we need to improve on.

We’ll be letting you know the results of the latest round of Learner Voice in a future edition of the Hub, and you’ll be able to see how your feedback has made a positive contribution to the way things are at college. Remember that you don’t need to wait until Learner Voice week to offer your comments and suggestions - you can use the Talkback forms (which you’ll find in Student Services) or speak to your Students’ Union officers.

8 StudentS’ union February iS LGbt month

Love comes in all colours, shapes and sizes

Equal L ve

9 GC students feature in local art exhibition

KS4 (Key Stage 4) teacher Jessica Follett tells the Hub about an exciting art collaboration between GC students and local artist Russell Haines: The exhibition is about involuntary emotion, it is about giving young people the chance to let people see the world through their eyes and banish stereotypes. The idea is once the paintings are finished the students get to write on the painting, this will be a short statement about themselves. I have given the students headings to work from such as: What makes you angry? What makes you happy? What does family/image mean to you? The intention of the students writing on the paintings is to make them a part of the painting. Russell has been getting to know the students and I believe he has captured them beautifully.

The museum really like the concept of this exhibition and have given the KS4 students a chance to exhibit their own work alongside Russell’s. This is an amazing opportunity for our students and Russell has inspired them to self-reflect and portray this through their own self-portraits. Having this opportunity to be painted and be a part of something so big is currently and will continue to have an unbelievably positive effect on the students’ self-esteem.

The first exhibition will be held at Gloucester Museum on Thursday Feb 7th, 6pm – 8pm, and the second more formal preview on Friday Feb 8th, 6pm – 8pm. There will hopefully be another chance to display the exhibition at the Cathedral in the cloisters. GC students feature in Sport Report By Will Merivale

Skiing local art exhibition Although the weather didn’t make us feel particularly festive, getting out on the slopes at Matson certainly helped. The Sport Level 2 group finished their six weeks of skiing by impressing the instructors enough to be awarded their Blue Badges.

Netball A team made up of students from our Gloucester Campus who train every Monday, 3pm in the sports hall played their first match away at South Gloucestershire and Stroud College on 10th December. The team narrowly lost but hope to turn the tables when SGS College come to the Gloucester Campus in the New Year. Special mention has to go to Allen McReynolds whose sharp shooting kept GC in the game right up until the last quarter.

Rugby A Gloucester-based squad headed to Stroud Rugby Club on a very chilly December afternoon. Both GC and South Gloucestershire and Stroud College have started rugby teams once more so a development fixture was arranged. SGS took the victory but once again the CoachingTeam are convinced the result can be overturned when Gordon League is the venue in January.

Tennis Peter Webb and Sam Turner represented #TeamGC at the British Colleges Sport Regional Tennis Finals held in Dudley on Wednesday 19th December. Peter played in the singles competition and topped his group to head to the semi-final. Unfortunately, despite going 2-0 up, his big-serving opponent proved too strong. It was over to the doubles competition where Sam and Peter destroyed all challengers. As a pairing they will now represent the West Midlands region in the National Finals to be held at Bath University in March. This is the first time Gloucestershire College have had a representative for any sport at the Nationals so good luck to you both. The College is very proud of your achievements already!

The Future… Sport Enrichment has been growing from strength to strength this academic year and will continue to do so with the appointment of a new College Sport Maker due to start this term. Their role will be to increase participation numbers and also increase the variety of sport/activity available to all GC students across all campuses. To date 221 students have participated in at least one of 15 sports including anything from handball to fishing. To assist with this delivery the University of Gloucestershire will be providing their students to help plan, organise and lead activities as well as to increase the College’s current number of leaders. Thanks in most part to the success of the students’ own passion for the sports 2013 will see the birth of new Sports Academies including Tennis and the PASS (Preparing Athletes for Sporting Success) Academy. Talented, individual athletes will be able to continue with their training while studying at GC while receiving nutritional information, a personal training programme, video analysis and specific coaching advice via the PASS scheme. 11 LONDON’S WESTEND THEATRE TRIP

Wednesday 6th February Tickets £20 - payable at Student Services Consent Form required to attend

RFD bus leaves at 09:30 Glos bus leaves at 09:30 Chelt bus leaves at 10:00