North West Hub
The University of Central Lancashire is privileged to host the North West SCiP Alliance hub. The University is a dedicated to supporting the Armed Forces community and is one of the few Universities to hold the Gold ERS award, demonstrating our commitment in this area .
The local picture surrounding the armed forces community in Lancashire identifies from the 2011 Census that across Lancashire there were 2,214 residents who stated they were employed by the armed forces. Throughout the county there are a recorded 1,137 service children in receipt of pupil premium (Lancashire County Council, 2019). In this area of England Lancaster and Fleetwood, Wigan and Blackpool South remain in the UK’s top ten constituency areas for recruiting personnel to the armed forces3 (House of Commons, 2019 making the north one of the largest areas for recruitment of armed forces personnel.
There are a number of initiatives supporting the Armed Forces community at both a national and local level throughout the county and at UClan we host both the:
• College for Military Veterans and Emergency Services
• Lancashire Armed Forces Covenant Hub
The College for Military Veterans and Emergency Services have developed strategic links to enable a North West offer for engaging the military community. In addition to collaborating with SCiP at a national level the team are working with colleagues at Lancashire County Council to develop a county-wide offer for children from military families.
Call to Action
The hub launched in June 2019 and we are now asking HEIs across the region to join the partnership and work with us to help improve education outcomes of young people from military families. By signing up to the partnership we ask the HEI's commit to the following:
- Develop an action plan for their area, working with local bodies (e.g. councils) to scope provision offered for children form military families in their region
- Attend at least two SCiP meetings per year
- Express a commitment towards working towards Armed Forces Covenant status
- Contribute to outreach activity at events hosted at UCLan.
Engaging young people from Armed Forces families through the following:
- Advice and guidance from the College for Military Veterans and Emergency Services (based at UCLan)
- Access to an annual CPD conference covering Military Family engagement
- Support and mentorship if you would like to host a military family engagement event.
Hub Chair: Rebecca Steel, University of Central Lancashire
Hub Vice-Chair: Rosie Fern, The Lancashire Colleges
Action Plan:
How to get involved:
If you have any questions or are interested in hearing more about the Hub, please contact us via email: RSteel@uclan.ac.uk
The Hub featured in Army & You magazine
