Lifelong Learning

Minister launches new EU funding programmes for adult learners and young people.

The Minister for Lifelong Learning, Bill Rammell MP, has launched two new EU-funded programmes, offering thousands of young people and adult learners new opportunities. The Lifelong Learning and Youth In Action programmes will make around £65 million available per year to institutions and organisations across the UK to help improve the quality of learning and training offered to individuals, address skills gaps and engage more people in education and training.

The Lifelong Learning Programme is aimed at learners of any age and at any stage in their education or training. This ranges from young people at school to adult learners, from students in Higher Education to those in vocational education and training. The programme enables learners to work with their European peers through joint projects, exchanges, work experience and much more. It also provides funding for education professionals to learn from best practice abroad and work with others across Europe to develop new ideas.

Youth in Action is targeted at young people and youth organisations and provides informal learning opportunities for young people, including the opportunity to work as volunteers abroad. It promotes social cohesion and intercultural dialogue among young people, especially among those not involved in formal education, training or employment.

Any organisation involved in education, training or youth work can apply for funding via these two programmes, including charities and community groups.

Key stakeholders and learners who had benefited from previous U unding joined the Minister at the launch. These programme ambassadors outlined the benefits they had gained, both personally and professionally, from the opportunity they were given.

Speaking at the event Bill Rammell said, "I am delighted to announce these new programmes. Having heard from our Programme Ambassadors it is clear that those who have already benefited from EU funding have relished the opportunity to learn more and gain new skills, work with people from different cultures and, ultimately, improve their futures.

"The programmes help everybody involved in education, training and youth work to achieve their goals and are therefore as significant for organisations as they are for individuals. That is why it is so important that we encourage everyone who works with learners and young people to consider how this programme might help them to help those they work with."

Bob Short, who works with the TEDDY BEAR (Twinning the Elderly Disadvantaged and Disabled with the Young By Enabling Active Reminiscence) project which has received EU funding in the past project, commented at the launch, "Our project focuses on inter-generational learning, bringing together ideas from the UK, Finland and Italy. We bring elderly people in sheltered accommodation into contact with children from local primary schools. The children learn about the life experiences of the older people, and the young people teach them IT skills. I’m hoping we can expand the project this year by taking people to visit their contemporaries in Finland.

"It's the most rewarding thing to see connections between the old and young blossoming. The elderly people always tell me that after spending time with the children they've never felt so young."

“We brought together an elderly chap called Donald who was quite isolated and reclusive and a young boy called Nathan who was a bit of a tearaway and kept getting himself into trouble. Something clicked between them when Nathan was learning about Donald’s experience of being orphaned during the war. Now whenever Nathan feels like he's going to go and do something he shouldn't, he goes to visit Donald instead, he's become a mentor to the boy."

The Lifelong Learning programme builds on and unites four existing programmes: Grundtvig, Leonardo da Vinci, Comenius and Erasmus. Youth in Action is a successor to the YOUTH Programme.

For more information about the Lifelong Learning programme visit: www.lifelonglearningprogramme.org.uk

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