Campaigning | City & Guilds Foundation

Invitation to take part: Improving Diversity in Craft Businesses with Cockpit

by Michael Osbaldeston | 20 Sep 2022 | Charity partners, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Heritage crafts, News

Calling all craft businesses. The craft world has a diversity problem – let’s change that. Craft businesses are invited to get involved in a new project to help improve diversity in the craft workforce. Our vision is a future industry where anyone, from any background, can get in and get on. Help us make it happen. Between October 2022 and July 2023, we will work with five businesses to explore and develop new approaches to improving workforce diversity. The opportunity is open to companies...

City & Guilds Foundation & The WOW Show release new wellbeing resources for students

by Lauren Roberts | 12 Sep 2022 | Awareness Raising, Charity partners, Funding, News, Resources, Youth engagement

With the new school year in full swing and student wellbeing a priority, the City & Guilds Foundation have teamed up with The WOW Show and partners Votes for Schools to launch an exciting new film and classroom resources to help young people build self-confidence. The animated film - The skills you didn’t know you had! - features a cast of near-peer characters in everyday situations underlining messages about the skills that are inside us all – if only we recognise them: Resilience,...

City & Guilds Foundation and Gower College Swansea launch innovative £100k project to support at risk young people into secure employment

by Polly Rowe | 8 Sep 2022 | Critical transition points, Funding, News, Our networks, Youth engagement

The City & Guilds Foundation and Gower College Swansea have entered into a new strategic partnership to support learners at risk of dropping out of education, overcome barriers and find positive ways to gain skills and enduring work. The funding will put up to 200 young people through a Transition & Engagement support programme, designed to raise aspirations and help disadvantaged and disengaged learners to develop and enhance existing skills to prepare them for the world of work. The...

Creating a diverse and inclusive online experience for our community

by Stuart Tucker | 31 Aug 2022 | Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, News

To support our diverse range of stakeholders who visit our websites, the City & Guilds Foundation now provides enhanced accessibility support online to create a barrier-free user experience. We pride ourselves by going the extra mile to always improve communication and quality of service for our customers and staff. To fulfil this mission, we now provide Recite Me assistive technology on our websites, to enable all our website visitors to customise their experience in a way that best suits...

How can you reduce your carbon footprint at work?

by Julia Bena | 17 Aug 2022 | Awareness Raising, News, Responsible Business

This guest post is by Enas Rauf who was an intern in the Foundation team during July and August 2022. A carbon footprint is the measure of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere as a result of economic or human activity. With small changes, we can get big results! If everyone did these little changes, it would help us reduce our impact on the environment and help us achieve a healthier lifestyle. Here are some tips to help you get started! 7 ways you can reduce your carbon footprint...

Widening participation in heritage crafts: training bursary for Black and ethnically diverse makers

by Lauren Roberts | 2 Aug 2022 | Charity partners, Critical transition points, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Funding, Heritage crafts, News

The City & Guilds Foundation sponsors the Heritage Crafts training bursary targeted at Black and ethnically diverse makers, which is an under-represented group in heritage crafts. This guest post is by Daniel Carpenter of Heritage Crafts. For more information, see their website: heritagecrafts.org.uk. It is still the case that the UK craft sector does not accurately reflect the diversity of the UK as a whole and, for this reason, we are taking positive action to target this grant at Black...

Applications for the London Creative Network (LCN) Programme at Cockpit open until 08 August 2022

by Stuart Tucker | 22 Jul 2022 | Charity partners, Heritage crafts, News, Our networks

The London Creative Network (LCN) Programme at Cockpit is a professional development programme designed to provide free creative business support to craftspeople who have talent and aspiration to succeed. They are now inviting applications to join them from September to December 2022. What's included Whatever stage you are in business or practice, confident communication is key to success. This autumn, our workshop programme will focus on advancing your business practice through communication...

How we’re supporting St Giles to change lives by investing in vital training

by Polly Rowe | 14 Jul 2022 | Awareness Raising, Campaigning, Funding, News, Prisoners and ex-offenders

St Giles is a London-based charity that helps people create a better future for themselves, and they’ve been an active part of our Foundation network for over five years. The charity works with people to overcome poverty, exploitation, abuse, addiction, mental health problems, crime or a combination of these issues. And a significant number of its peer advisors are people who have overcome their own struggles – often through St Giles’ own programmes. The peer advisors then use their ‘lived...

Unlocking refugee talent to access skilled people looking for work

by Lauren Roberts | 11 Jul 2022 | Awareness Raising, Campaigning, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Events, News, Our networks, Refugee support

The City & Guilds Foundation recently ran a virtual event with our partners The Launchpad Collective to examine how to unlock refugee talent to access skilled people looking for work. The Launchpad Collective (TLC) connects employers with refugee talent. Steered by refugees, for refugees, working side-by-side with both job seekers and employers so that roles are filled and refugees are empowered to contribute positively to society. TLC also...

Pride Month: celebrating LGBTQ+ inclusion in our networks

by Mike Ormand | 29 Jun 2022 | Awareness Raising, Campaigning, City & Guilds initiatives, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, News

The history of LGBTQ+ Pride Month LGBTQ+ Pride Month is celebrated each year in the month of June to honour the 1969 Stonewall Uprising in Manhattan. The Stonewall Uprising was a tipping point for the Gay Liberation Movement in the United States and its impact was felt globally. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the first Pride march in the UK, a day when hundreds of LGBTQ+ people and their allies arrived in London to protest a society where we were not safe to be ourselves. The actions...