Crummy Lives

Here is my first rant about the lack of funding available to projects like the one I work on. (There will probably be more later).

A couple of weeks ago, a young girl got stabbed and died from her injuries. As it turned out, she was a client of the housing charity I work for where she was getting support to help her with a housing issue. Her boyfriend was on a cooking course ran the project I manage. He has said he will come back on the course, but understandably he has other priorities right now, which, at a guess, include grieving, supporting his girlfriend’s family through a rough patch, etc…

If he doesn’t finish the course, we don’t get paid by our funders for giving him the training. Is this crazy or what? What are we supposed to say? “Well, Chris (not his real name) we realise you are really upset about your girlfriend dying on you, but we really need you to come and finish your portfolio – not because we believe it’s important to you, but because we want the money”. Absurd, isn’t it? I really don’t blame the people who pay us though. They are only responding to Learning and Skills council targets, which in turn are determined by stupid government priorities and targets.

I found out today that over 50% of adults who enroll on literacy and numeracy courses do not get a full qualification. Is the response to this by the LSC to say that maybe people Aren’t too bothered about the qualification and just want a bit of a push in the right direction? Of course not! They are now saying that only courses that do lead to full qualifications will be funded. That could mean over 40% of people who would potentially benefit form some literacy or numeracy teaching, either being forced onto a course they don’t want to do, or not getting the training.

It is absolutely ludicrous that those who need the most help are falling further and further away from the mainstream, and the government give all this spin about education. They haven’t a bloody clue what projects like ours do and the sort of issues our clients have to deal with. I really wish they’d get off their high horses and come and have a look round at what it’s like in the real life for once!