Diplomanet Event held on 2nd July at Portal Premier Golf Course

The last event to mark the end of the current phase of the Diplomanet project took place July 2nd, attended by businesses, educational practitioners and people with a real interest in developing the skills and abilities of our young people to fully prepare them for future working life.  The other key reason for putting maximum effort into developing tomorrow’s workforce is of course that they will be able to leave education, skilled and well prepared to make their contribution to our economy. The new diplomas, introduced in schools last September and being phased in over the next 4 years will play a key part in developing the kind of skills that employers want.

The Diplomanet project has focused on the Creative and Media diploma, running in Leftwich and Rudheath High schools and in the Mid Cheshire College - bringing together a network of employers from the Creative Industries and students who have chosen to study this diploma. The employers commissioned real life business tasks for the students to complete which also  had to meet the diploma assessment requirements.

Last night focused on the wider application of this innovative model of work related learning – a network of businesses linked directly to students in schools and colleges, mentoring , supporting and guiding them as they produced pieces of work to satisfy both business and education. No easy task!

At last night’s event, David Duffy (chief Executive of Cheshire FM) and well used to the art of presenting, took the role of MC for the night. Andrew Heydeman Employment and Skills Manager for Cheshire and Warrington Enterprise Agency and John Stephens, Director Children’s Services Cheshire West and Chester both gave inspiring speeches about the need for business and education to work together to produce a future work force with world class skills.

The brand new Diplomanet DVD was launched, featuring students, employers and teaching staff who had been involved with the project. Awards were made to students who in the eyes of judges from the business sector had shown real creativity and flair in their work for the project as well as maintaining a high quality standard throughout.

Award winners were:
Rudheath
James Hilditch
Elizabeth Borley
Chloe Johnson

Leftwich
Alex Fitton
James Lewis
Connor McTasney

Mid Cheshire College
Matthew Baxter
Adam Knopp

The Students were also asked to nominate employers to receive an award. This was for their support, commitment and encouragement during the project. The winners were:

Gill Nichols The Potters wheel
Paul Smith Reactive Audio
Steve Millard Grove Creative

This was an excellent opportunity to bring together education and business, to review what had been achieved through the diplomanet project and look to the future to see how this unique tool for allowing each of these worlds an insight into the other’s, can be put to best use for everyone.