News & events | City & Guilds Foundation

New skills fund to unlock £500m per year employment potential of UK prison population supporting efforts to rebuild after Covid

by Laura Mountain | 22 Sep 2020 | Critical transition points, Funding, Future Skills Commission for Prisons, News, Our networks, Prisoners and ex-offenders

Unlocking the skills potential of the UK’s prison population could put £500million a year back into the economy in lowering reoffending rates alone[1], a much-needed boost as we seek to rebuild the economy following Covid, new analysis from the City & Guilds Foundation suggests. The findings come as City & Guilds, the leading skills development provider, launches an ambitious new Future Skills Commission for Prisons to use jobs and training to help divert prisoners from committing...

Junior Smart: Meaningful work will keep ex-offenders like me out of prison

by Laura Mountain | 21 Sep 2020 | Case studies, Future Skills Commission for Prisons, News, Our networks, Prisoners and ex-offenders

The Foundation’s Big Idea Fund wants to experiment, to find out what really works so that it can be scaled up and used elsewhere. It is going out to brilliant charities and innovative prison projects that want to partner up and find practical solutions to one of our society’s biggest problems. I believe a big idea like this has never been needed more. View this post on Instagram Meaningful work will keep ex-offenders like me out of prison, writes Junior Smart a member of our Future...

The Clink charity launches Clink@Home takeaway / delivery service

by Stuart Tucker | 20 Aug 2020 | Charity partners, Future Skills Commission for Prisons, News, Our networks, Prisoners and ex-offenders

The Clink Charity has launched a takeaway / delivery service at HMP Brixton called Clink@Home. This has enabled The Clink to keep the restaurant open during lockdown, keeping prisoners employed and allowing them to continue studying towards their qualifications. Great @BBCNews feature showing the impact @TheClinkCharity has on reducing re-offending. If you live within 5 miles of @HMP_Brixton please support #ClinkAtHome - you'll be helping prisoners to continue studying towards their...

UK businesses’ training is recognised by HRH The Princess Royal on her 70th birthday

by Stuart Tucker | 14 Aug 2020 | News, Princess Royal Training Awards

HRH The Princess Royal, President of City & Guilds Group, recognises organisations whose training has delivered measurable business impact Businesses continue to deliver excellent training programmes in the Princess Royal Training Award’s fifth year, despite the impact of Covid Recipients from a wealth of sectors including health and social care, manufacturing, public sector and technology all proved the value of investing in L&D to address a wide range of business needs. 14 August...

Recovery and Resilience report: reskilling our way back into work

by Laura Mountain | 21 Jul 2020 | City & Guilds initiatives, Critical transition points, News, Our networks

The City & Guilds Group's most recent research Recovery and resilience: Reskilling our way back into work surveyed 2,000 working and non-working adults in the UK and found that people from lower socio-economic groups were less likely to believe that they have the support needed to get a new job in several critical areas: Using support from my personal contacts: 24% C2DE vs 35% ABC1 Using support from previous employer: 18% C2DE vs 28% ABC1 Using support from a recruitment consultant: 18%...

Essential financial support now available for social enterprises through £18.7m Covid-19 grants

by Polly Rowe | 14 Jul 2020 | Charity partners, Critical transition points, Funding, News, Our networks

Here at the City & Guilds Foundation, we’re incredibly proud to support UnLtd – a leading provider of support to social entrepreneurs in and around the UK. Today, UnLtd have made an exciting announcement about a new Social Enterprise Support Fund. The Fund is directly responding to an urgent need in the sector to help social enterprises change the way they work, make their spaces COVID-secure, and manage liquidity during the next six months. There are five social enterprise support...

Bridging the gap between employer and employee with MyKindaFuture’s Will Akerman

by Laura Mountain | 22 May 2020 | Awareness Raising, Case studies, Charity partners, News, Our networks

City & Guilds has been a strategic partner of MyKindaFuture for a long time. We’ve always been closely aligned with their belief that everyone should have equal power and opportunity to shape their future – wherever they come from, whatever their experience, and whoever they are. In particular, MyKindaFuture has focused on bridging the gap between employer and employee and helping them feel better connected and invested in each other. With businesses facing a huge variety of challenges...

United by purpose – a letter to Princess Royal Training Awards applicants from Princess Anne

by Michael Osbaldeston | 22 May 2020 | News, Our networks, Princess Royal Training Awards

It’s fair to say, that no one alive has ever experienced a time like this. You have to go back to the post-WW1 flu, the cholera epidemics that would lead to modern sanitation, The Black Death and the great plagues. For all of us, it really is unprecedented, and it has led to us adopting working practices that would have been impossible not that long ago. In fact, before the advent of modern technology and the digital age, this would have been truly catastrophic. We simply wouldn’t have been...

Engaging with young people during Covid-19

by Lauren Roberts | 14 Apr 2020 | Awareness Raising, Campaigning, News, Our networks, Youth engagement

Our research tells us that long before the pandemic young people often struggle to enter the world of work. Depending on who you know your experience of moving from education to paid work can be a real struggle and one in which many obstacles must be overcome. Through our Youth Engagement work we strive to take a practical approach in informing and helping young people who may be at risk of becoming NEET, to make more informed choices about their future. Our main focus is creating engaging and...

A commitment to the beneficiaries supported through the City & Guilds Foundation

by Polly Rowe | 9 Apr 2020 | Charity partners, Funding, News, Our networks

The City & Guilds Foundation, along with a wider group of funders, recognise that the covid-19 outbreak is an exceptional event that will have an impact on civil society groups, and want to offer reassurance that we stand with the sector during this time. We wish to be as helpful as possible during the coming weeks and months so that civil society groups can focus on the vital work of supporting some of the most vulnerable people in our communities. We understand that there will be times...