Alan Sugar, The Apprentice and The Factory
By Andrew Lake, Area Youth Work Coordinator, Young People at Risk.
I am writing this in Gage Cabin which is part of the Residential Services provision at Beaumanor. It’s a Sunday and it’s early in the morning. I’ve just drunk my second steaming mug of coffee. The young people, all members of ‘The Factory’ project, are not up yet, very soon, I’ll pop my head round their dorm doors and let them know it is time to get up and cook the breakfast and start the final part of their weekend away as a group, but at the moment I sit quietly reflecting on the three days work they have put into understanding and developing a peer education project. The walls of the kitchen area are festooned with pieces of flip chart paper, all over them are written ideas, thoughts, ground rules and designed sessional ideas and more. Wow!
The Factory began life in 2000. It is a Loughborough based, detached youth work project for Asian young men. The project forms one element of Leicestershire Youth Service strategic aim to increase the active involvement of BME communities. It was established by me and Colin Goodwin, a part time youth worker.
Many people ask me why the group is called ‘The Factory’. Well in the early days when the youth work team would wander around the streets trying getting to know the young people and the patch, we would often come across a group of young men who would gather together in a derelict factory. It was this group that helped us shape, develop and named the group, ’The Factory’.
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In the early days the youth work team spent many months of hard work and persistence explaining what they were doing and why. Membership has grown from just a few young men to well over 70 and still growing.
The Factory members have become involved in a diverse variety of youth work activity and group work ranging from outdoor pursuits, camping, workshops on health, identity, racism and lots more. The group also celebrates cultural events such as Eid.
This is a group that loves debates and discussion – we recently had a furious debate in the new youth wing at the Moira centre, entitled ‘Storm’ that focused on exploring the issue of infamous cartoons and Islam.
Some of you may also remember their input into Vox Pop at County Hall where they spoke about some of the issues that were affecting them. This piece of work helped to lay the foundations for the redevelopment and expansion of the Moira Centre to create new space for youth work and community use.
The Peer Education weekend started late on Friday night. Many of the chosen group are employed in local restaurants or go to local colleges so the close proximity of Beaumanor was ideal. On the first night the group which ranged from 16-20 years of age wanted to chill out and enjoy each others company. The evening saw them watch a presentation prepared by Akkas Miah, one of their part time Youth Workers. A central part of this was a DVD which featured photographs of all the activities the Factory have become involved in with since day one. The group set itself its own ground rules and made decisions on the work rota for who would be cooking meals, washing up, cleaning, mopping the floors, hoovering and emptying the bins.
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The next morning an eager team enjoyed a team breakfast and started the first workshops before 9am! The weekend was designed to enable the group to form peer education teams which could visit and deliver to other groups of young people workshops that explained and explored Asian culture and identity, thereby challenging racism, misunderstanding, prejudice and Islam phobia.
The morning was spent on team building, communication and listening skills games which the peer education teams could use in interacting with other youth groups. The next activities were designed for the young people to explore who they were. Dividing the group into two teams they had to draw around a team member and using words and pictures onto the drawing explore and explain, their own cultural identity – ‘Who are you? What makes you the person you are? Were the questions the two teams had too explore and then deliver their thoughts and findings too the other team.
The two teams really threw themselves into the challenge. Fantastic drawings featuring mosques, gold chains, traditional Bengali clothes and designer labels were added too their figures. Words and terms surrounded each of the two figures, but significantly has the exercise continued the debate deepen into a full discussion about East West identity conflict – in fact one group felt so strongly about this that right through their figure from head to toe they wrote the term, ‘East and West Conflict’. These are some comments made by the young people during the exercise.
“We getting a bit lost, we’re losing our culture, we’re sort of confused”
“We’re full of East and West conflicts”
“White people feel threaten by us because they think we are invaded their country”
“We not Black we are Asian”
“Our parents are clear who they are but we are not”
“We are clear as young people what we want to be but our parents do not understand that”
“The second generation is lost because they are all going in different direction”
“We like our new culture because it gives us more freedom”
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After a lunch break, the two teams were given a brief of moulding the material and debate from the morning and anything they could also think of into an educational workshop they could deliver to other young people. To make it even more demanding, the two teams would compete with each other and to really put them under pressure they had to deliver the workshop to ‘Alan Sugar’ from the TV show ‘The Apprentice’ – well not the real one, but me doing a full on role play.
Two hours later the two teams entered a kitchen area laid out like a boardroom. Each team delivered their presentations. One featured an ICT element focusing on terrorism, Islam and Politics the other an exploration of Asian identity through the use of traditional Bengali games, food, clothes etc. Both teams were questioned in full on Alan Sugar style and direct and difficult, challenging questions were made to individuals. Both teams fought their corners and stood up to the intensity of assessment. I had too choose between great teams who had thought out many of the difficulties their workshops would produce. They had clear strategies for dealing with their peers who didn’t want to listen and learn. The workshops would be challenging and educational, both showed good planning and had clear outcomes.
I was very impressed. A still silence descended as I considered which team would be sacked. In the end I told the teams that I would hire them both, a groan arose and someone stated that they should have expected a youth worker not to make a clear decision and judgement! (Interesting comment!), but I couldn’t make a decision, both teams had produced very different workshops and if combined they would be fantastic!
This intense day finished with a meal at Aroma Spice at Birstall, a late night movie at the cabin. The Sunday we arose late and went to do SnoTubing at Swadlincote. Great fun.
What a great weekend.
The Factory Peer Education team is already booked to deliver 9 workshops – if you want them to visit you please contact us 01509 267 796 or alake@leics.gov.uk.
