Lif Caravan update Stephen Kitch

16th February 2023 Update on Life Education Caravan Stephen Kitch

Before Stephen presented Stan updated on the funds raised at Saturday’s Frog Race at £1817, which was proposed by Adrian to fund a further 3 Shelter boxes for the Turkey/Syria Earthquake.

Stephen who is a member of Long Eaton Dawn breakers club, who currently meet in the evening! He then reminded us that the Life Caravan had started its career in 1994 and they believe that the programme has delivered to about 500 000 children.

Unfortunately, the pandemic naturally caused serious funding problems, although with the support of the City and County Councils funding the Family learning for Parental Skills, they survived.

They changed their name to Life Education East Midlands with Northamptonshire and Leicestershire Trusts joining in 2022 and with the support of Coram Life Education, the UK’s leading health and drug education organisation (believed as the oldest charity in the world, starting in 1739 covering adoption and legal work) they sold off the caravans and Land Rovers to keep their ‘educators’ and began work writing the programmes in digital format, so they could offer schools the programme on line.

Their offer includes SCARF resources for Primary and Nursery schools, a comprehensive, progressive PSHE and RSE scheme of work for 3 to11 year-olds, high-quality, educator-led workshops for pupils and a host of free and low-cost staff training.  Truly supporting schools with a Whole-school approach to wellbeing and Mental Health. Their vision is for all children to acquire the life skills needed to thrive.

SCARF – Safety, Caring, Achievement, Resilience, Friendship

Their workshops use a best-practice, three-strand approach, addressing children’s knowledge, skills, attitudes and values. All workshops support the DfE statutory requirements for RSHE and are aligned with the National Curriculum.

Life Space is a pop up mobile tent classroom, which has gone down well with teachers and pupils creating an exciting, interactive and inspiring environment (Harold’s new home!). Their educator-led workshops combine the themes of keeping safe, relationships and growing and changing, contributing also to Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural, safeguarding and mental health requirements.

Evaluation is crucial and 99% of Headteachers and teachers recommend Life Education and SCARF. Children’s emotional and physical wellbeing helps them thrive, both academically and socially, in preparation for adulthood. The fantastic work they do relies on the dedication of their staff team and a group of volunteering Trustees.

Stephen spoke of the challenges they face due to the current economic climate and the need to offer financial support some schools to enable them to continue to access these programmes.

Stephen thanked our Club for all it’s support over the years, with a particular mention of all the selfless work done by Trustee Bill Banner.

A few question about percentages and costs were fielded by Stephen, then Jim Gostick thanked him for his informative presentation and bringing us up to date from our previous work of towing the caravan to schools in our area to the present day ‘on line’ approach and the members joined him in the normal manner.

              AR