The Bridge Community Centre

The aim of the project is to enable a group of young people to become more integrated within their own community by showcasing the Adventure Playground in Ore.

Plans for our event in the Adventure Playground are developing apace. The young people from Hastings Academy are planning and contributing ideas that will be of interest to children from the local primary schools.  A date has been set for Friday 6 July and schools from the locality have been invited.  Meanwhile, research into community and alternative learning is being carried out by Dr Deborah Madden and Debra Huleat (student research assistant).  We've already managed to cover much of the secondary contextual research and have embarked on the empirical primary data - interviews and questionnaires are taking place next week.  Thankfully, we can also avail of the expertise of Professor Yvonne Hillier, who has kindly agreed to cast a critical eye over our findings when we have a first draft.  The idea is to present our findings first at the Hastings Research Seminar Series, with a view to publishing them in article or report form. 

An unexpected bonus has been the discovery that one of the Trustee for the Bridge is someone who has completed an MPhil in education research at the University of Brighton.  This person has been very valuable in terms of giving advice, expertise and mentoring to the student research assistant, particularly as he has worked in education and has been Head Teacher at a local primary school for many years before recently retiring.  This is an excellent example of collaborative learning and sharing of knowledge and best practice in the community".