February 21, 2012 by lallyd
The team behind Blackpool Youth Question Time, which I blogged about last week have posted some videos of the events on their YouTube channel. For those of you who were a bit bewildered by my last blog post on this topic, or found it too long to read, why not watch the videos below and see what to make of the event for yourselves.
Lally.
Category Education, Events, Politics, Student Union, Youth | Tags: , #bpypqt, #bpyqt, #bpyqt12, blackpool, coast, Fylde, people, Question, Time, Young, Youth, youtube | No Comments
February 12, 2012 by lallyd
On Thursday of this week, I was invited to attend the first ever Blackpool Youth Question Time, held at the City Learning Centre, on Grange Park in Blackpool. I was invited as one of 5 allocated places for Blackpool & The Fylde college, and was asked by the College’s Student Liason Officer, as part of my responsibilities as a Students’ Union exec member. I was really pleased to be invited to the event and found the evening really interesting.
The event was organised (I think) by the team behind @rubothered on behalf of Blackpool Council.
The panel was chaired by the head of ‘Employability’ at Blackpool & Fylde College, Chris Thomas and was made up of the following people;
Conservative Councillor Paul Galley (PG)
Liberal Democrat Councillor Douglas Green (DG)
Labour Councillor Chris Maughan (CM)
Member of Youth Parliament for Blackpool Lauren Anderson (LA)
Blackpool Young Persons Council Chair Nicole Burke (NB)
It was great to see the young ladies charged with representing the ‘youth’ of Blackpool, speak so coherently and passionately about the issues affecting young people in the area.
The format of the evening was that there would be two sessions, with a short interval in between. In the first session, questions from young people who were unable to attend were asked, which included questions on tackling racism and youth unemployment. Both serious issues affecting many young people across the Fylde.
In response to the question on youth unemployment;
CM said that cuts made by the previous administration of as much as 50% to youth funding meant that it was difficult to offer the level of support to young people the Labour party would like. However he insisted that support would still be provided and that vulnerable young people would be made the priority.
PG, who runs a private recruitment company said that the key would be to identify a 30 year plan, which would see the Fylde coast linking current education to the skills required in the future. He also said that schemes like the Princes Trust would be a good example to follow and that young people needed to be ‘inspired & nurtured’ to raise their aspirations and help them to start businesses of their own.
NB responded by asking what could be done now to help 16-17 year olds struggling to find work, with services such as Connexions being cut, she felt that young people weren’t getting the careers guidance they needed, and would often leave the town to seek employment elsewhere.
DG said an emphasis needed to be placed on schemes such as apprenticeships, but that would be difficult since many of the companies that used to offer apprenticeships such as BT were no longer public sector companies. He also said that the onus should be placed on young people to try to seek employment, and that the culture of having things handed to you on a plate was to blame.
LA insisted that careers advice was what was lacking, particularly in schools, she agreed with DG that young people should be pushing themselves to create opportunities but more companies in the town were needed, that offer more than just seasonal work.
During this discussion, Paul Maynard Conservative MP for Blackpool North was invited to contribute and said that we need to diversify the economy across the Fylde coast and work across councils to get successful schemes such as apprenticeships set up. He also talked about private sector services, such as BenEast who can offer careers advice and guidance for young people.
The next question was about tackling racism between young people?
DG said that there needs to be better education in schools about the affects of racist behaviour, and that parents should take responsibility for teaching their children about this issue. He also said that peer pressure could be used in a positive way to get the message across that it isn’t acceptable to be racist.
NB said that the message needed to be spread further and that young people of Blackpool needed to work together to do this.
LA said that she thought the punishment for any racist attack should be the same, no matter whether you’re the England football captain or an everyday person. She also said people needed to be made aware of the consequences of being racist.
PG said that the country as a whole needed to work together to embrace multiculturalism.
The Chief Constable for Lancashire Police was brought in on this topic and reiterated that there is no place in society for any form of hate crime and discrimination, and that so far raising awareness of the issue has helped reduce incidents of this type. He also stated that it was important that schools and colleges had good anti-bullying procedures in place and that young people are made aware that the Police will take action on these types of offences.
After these questions, there was a brief interval. In the second half, questions on transport, cuts to youth services and changes to the bus timetables and routes were raised by members of the audience.
The first question was about what specific youth service provisions are there for people with disabilities?
A lady in the audience (I didn’t catch her name or role) responded that new provisions were being made at Mereside called ‘Aim Higher’ which is a facility opening fully in March specifically for young people with disabilities and their siblings and parents. The facility offers the area’s first soft play centre for disabled youths as well as many other fantastic opportunities for disabled young people.
Another audience member added that there are plenty of voluntary youth organisations working in conjunction with local authorities, such as; boys ‘n’ girls club, Tramshed and Tiggers.
The next question was from a colleague of mine on the Students’ Union, Sam Richardson who asked whether there were any plans to support students with the cost of transport in Blackpool, by introducing a student fare or extending the existing Wave Card provision. Sam put this question into context by bringing up the cuts to EMA which meant that many students found it increasingly difficult to afford the cost of getting to college.
CM responded by agreeing that he thought the cuts to EMA were appalling and that in his experience he and his brother would never have been able to get to college without it. He said that at present Blackpool Council, who are the majority stakeholders in Blackpool Transport were in reviews to see if and how changes could be made to make the cost of travel more affordable.
NB said that lots of young people found the cost of travel a huge barrier to accessing services and employment, not just education. She said that the Blackpool Young Persons Council (BYPC) were in talks with Blackpool Transport about trying to extend the Wave Card to 19 year olds.
PG said that the EMA would be replaced by a 16-19 ‘bursary fund’ which would helps those who most needed support and pointed out how lucky he thought we were in comparison to some places were the buses stop running at 5pm.
During this discussion, the audience heard from Trevor Roberts from Blackpool Transport, who agreed to sit down with BYPC and try to extend the Wave Card, he also said that since September 2011, they have been working with Blackpool & Fylde College and Blackpool 6th to offer reduced fares, but that perhaps more information needed to be provided about how these fares can be accessed. He also brought up that Blackpool Transport has only increased its prices once in the last three years, and that was down to the rising cost of fuel, as opposed to increasing profit margins.
The final question of the evening was asked about why youth groups have been cut, and often youth workers moved to other jobs?
DG put the onus on the economic climate, saying that cuts were having to be made and that all areas were bound to suffer.
PG said that in his ward they were allocating more of their budget to youth services than in previous years, and that the 30 year plan he talked about earlier would help support young people.
LA said it was appalling that no consultation had taken place with the young people who were going to be affected by the 50% cuts to youth services.
CM explained that the 50% cuts to youth services were made before Labour took over in May 2011, and that young people were always going to be a target for cuts. He also explained that once the budget had been set, there was nothing they could do to put that money back into youth services, as it was being spent elsewhere, but that it would be reviewed at the next budget.
That was all of the questions that were asked on the night, and my recollection of the answers provided. I thought the panel were excellent and it was great to see so many people in positions of power, who can make changes and decisions to help young people in Blackpool in attendance. As I said earlier, I thought Lauren and Nicole both did an excellent job of representing the young people in Blackpool, who often get a bad press.
It was really enjoyable to see so many people coming together from different sectors and services to try and improve the lives of young people in Blackpool, and I sincerely hope that there will be another ‘youth’ question time soon.
Lally.
Category Education, Student Union | Tags: , #bypqt, #byqt, #byqt12, blackpool, BYPC, College, conservative, Council, Councillor, democrat, EMA, labour, lib dem, liberal, parliament, paul maynard, Person, Politics, Question, racism, rubothered, school, Time, tory, transport, unemployment, Young, Youth | 1 Comment
February 11, 2012 by lallyd
I was inspired this week to cut out eating ‘junk’ food at home, so instead of a packet of crisps, eat some crackers or rice cakes, instead of chocolate have a yoghurt or a piece of fruit. Inevitably, I got bored of that quite quickly and decided to make some flapjacks.
I’d forgotten that I blogged about a flapjack recipe I’d made a few months before on here, and went googling for ‘everything flapjack’, hoping that I’d find some creative ideas for flavours to add to a basic recipe, and I found this recipe entitled ‘Flapjack all kinds of ways’.
Using the measurements listed on the site, I decided to experiment with my ‘extras’
Ingredients:
160g butter
115g demerara sugar
1 tsbsp golden syrup
240g porridge oats
115g extras (optional)
So far, I’ve made three batches of these flapjacks. The first ones had 50g milk chocolate chips and 65g of mixed nuts and raisins. I also used a muffin tin to bake this batch, and found the mixture divided quite nicely into 12 portions, albeit quite large ones!
The second and third batch I made at the same time and tray baked, with a piece of foil covered card used to separate the two batches on the same baking tray. To half of the mix I added 40g white chocolate chips, 40g of crushed banana chips and 35g dessicated coconut. To the other half I added 50g dark chocolate and 65g of mixed nuts and seeds.
The first batch I made went down a storm, with a wonderful crunch on the outside and soft chewy insides. The second batch were a bit experimental, and even though they were nice, I think I’d use fresh banana rather than banana chips next time, as the chips give a nice crunchy texture but don’t add as much flavour as fresh bananas do.
The third batch were my favourite. I was worried that the dark chocolate might make them a bit bitter, but actually it had the opposite effect of balancing out the sweetness of the syrup used in the recipe. The nuts & seeds give a lovely texture, however because these were tray baked they stayed soft and didn’t get crunchy on the outside, which would have been nice. Next time I think I’ll try them in a muffin tin. I’m also going to have a go dropping the chocolate from the recipe and topping up with fruits/nuts and dipping the next batch in melted chocolate, as I saw on Nigel Slater’s Christmas programme!
So there we have it, flapjacks three ways or as I call them “everything flapjacks”.
Category Food | Tags: , banana, chocolate, everything, flapjack, fruit, nigel, nut, recipe, seeds, slater | No Comments
October 29, 2011 by lallyd
So a few weeks ago I blogged about my efforts to be elected as student union HE Communications Officer at my college in Blackpool.
I found out on Monday of this week, that I was elected with a majority of 47 votes to 2, who voted to re-open nominations.
I’m really pleased with the result. Even though it doesn’t seem like a great deal of votes, I actually didn’t do much to get them, other than contact some of my tutors and encourage them to let their classes know that voting was open and to put up a handful of posters around campus.
My duties start on Monday really, when I’ll be getting my class rep training and meeting a few more of the union executive committee.
I’m nervous about what my responsibilities will be, hopefully nothing I can’t handle! Equally excited though to see what challenges lie ahead.
Lally.
Category Education, Ramblings, Student Union | Tags: , bispham, blackpool, College, communication, election, Fylde, HE, officer, student, union | No Comments
October 25, 2011 by lallyd
Recently I’ve been thinking about making things to sell online. The thought occurred to me a while ago when my Mum asked me about how much her lavender bags (little heart shaped pockets filled with lavender we grow in our garden) would sell for at a craft fair. I told her that people would probably pay anywhere between 50p and £1.50 for something one off like that, depending on the area and the type of customers you get in. Since having this chat over the summer, I’ve started noticing lots of little things that either her or I make that could be making us money on the world wide web, as opposed to being gifted to relatives who put them in drawers and forget about them!
So, I’ve opened a Folksy shop. It will hopefully be a place where I can sell a few odds and ends that we already have floating around, but also where Mum and I can start selling the things that we’re making more recently. I for one am thoroughly invested in making hama bead things in an array of geeky 8 bit styles, thanks to Catherine at Barcamp Blackpool!
So anyway. I’ve gone with oo-de-lallyd on Folksy as my seller name. hopefully I’ll get some pictures and stuff up there soon and my selling adventure can begin. So far I’ve just made a few fridge magnets and a couple of badges which I’m hoping to upload by the end of the week.
Eventually the plan is to churn out these badges/magnets and maybe expand and make a few bigger pieces, such as coasters/mousemats. If you’d like to see anything specific, just leave me a comment and I’ll see if I can make something up for you. Next, I want to try and make a Princess Peach & a Link! Geeky, I know.
Lally.
Category Crafts, Ramblings | Tags: , 8bit, arts, badge, beads, crafts, etsy, folksy, hama, lavender, magnet, mario, pacman, sprite | No Comments
October 6, 2011 by lallyd
Recently I’ve been observing my Mum and a friend of her’s endeavour to bring live music to Fleetwood. Whilst this is great, and I blogged a few weeks ago about the brilliant talent that is Alex Hulme gracing our small town with his presence, they seriously need to move into the 21st Century.
To date, they’ve been using traditional media methods, such as having adverts & articles printed in the local papers & putting up posters around town. Whilst this has shown some success with most of the gigs being pretty well attended despite the lack of any web presence I had to step in and get them set up with a facebook account!
I’ve been spouting the virtues of advertising via facebook and twitter to them for the last few weeks, explaining that it will encourage a broader range of age groups to attend the gigs, not just the over 40s that take the time to read the “events” section in the newspaper.
I don’t know anyone that reads the Fleetwood Gazette or weekly news around my age group, either a physical copy or online. However I do know what’s going on in Fleetwood that might interest me, because my friends on facebook post about it, or add an event or photo, or whatever!
So here we are, with our facebook page, which needs much more content in order to drive people to the site, I know, but it’s only 24 hours old, so forgive me! The direct URL (which thanks to facebook, I no longer have to wait for 25 likes to get) is www.facebook.com/thepastairwell
and here’s my little widget thing, that facebook generated the code for! It’s all very clever, as I keep trying to tell my Mum.
So anyway, I’d love it if you could bob along and like the page for me, but even better than that if you could actually turn up to one of the gigs and enjoy some free live music, then like the page on facebook and tell all your friends about it.
Next step, twitter!
Lally.
Category Events, Music, Ramblings | Tags: , facebook, fleetwood, friday, live, music, night, prince arthur, the stairwell | 1 Comment
October 5, 2011 by lallyd
So as part of my quest to be elected as Communications Officer, I had to create a campaign poster to put up around the college, alongside a manifesto in order to try and get people to vote for me.
Votes are being cast between 17th and 21st October, so hopefully I’ve enough time before then to spread my name about and get people behind my cause!
I’ve included a copy of the poster for you have a look at. Any feedback would be warmly welcome. I’ve also added the copy from my manifesto for you get have a look at. Hope you like it! Please leave a comment letting me know what you think, positive or not 
Lalita D’Cruze – Communications Officer Poster
My manifesto:
“My name is Lalita D’Cruze, most people call me Lally. I am standing for the position of H.E. Communications Officer.
I am a second year BSc IT student already involved with some activities happening both in and outside of the college. I believe there are a lot of great things going on around campus that not everyone knows about. There are loads of activities and groups already running at the college, as well as discounts and special offers for students which aren’t being taken advantage of simply because people don’t know they exist.
If elected I will do as much as I can to help any society, student or faculty in promoting their activities or events to the student body. I will do my best to ensure everyone knows about what’s happening at the Student Union and how they are working with the college to constantly improve your time here. I will try to keep the information relevant and easy to understand, whilst continuing the great work already being done by the Student Union, by communicating with students through Facebook, Twitter & around campus.
I would be happy to take on any feedback about the current communication system at the Student Union and will strive to improve it to make sure your voice is heard by the Student Union and college where possible.
I am really passionate about sharing and communicating and I recently completed a level two certificate in British Sign Language, which helped me to understand the challenges some people face with communicating on a daily basis. I have also spent time working with organisations in the local community to promote music nights, conferences and technology events and maintain two blogs and a twitter account covering these topics and more.
I believe the more people are involved in the student community; the better it can grow to be.
Vote for me via Moodle as Communications Officer and you’ll never be out of the loop.
Lally”
Don’t forget to leave a comment!
Thanks,
Lally.
Category Education, Ramblings, Student Union | Tags: , 2011, bispham, blackpool, College, communication, education, election, Fylde, higher, officer, student, union, vote | 2 Comments
September 30, 2011 by lallyd
I started back at college last week and lessons properly kicked off on Tuesday, and it turns out my college timetable means I only have to go in one day a week!
Whilst this seemed great at first, I’ve quickly come to the realisation that I’m going to have a lot of free time, even with the time spent doing assignments from home.
Obviously my first thought was to get a job. However it seems those aren’t that easy to come by, not that I’ve been trying very hard either.
So instead of investing time in the pursuit of a part time-low pay job, I’ve decided to get more involved at the college.
The hope is that being more involved will give me a better chance of getting onto the PGCE after graduation, as well as looking good to prospective employers.
This week I nominated myself as class rep against 3 others from my class. The votes fell 8 | 5 | 1 | 1 in my favour and the person with 5 votes was chosen to be the deputy rep.
Whilst a lot of people have put me off being class rep, saying it’s hard work for little return I think I could be good at it, and I’m determined to get behind my class and try and improve our experience of education.
I also nominated myself yesterday for the position of HE Communications Officer at the student union. This weekend I will be creating my manifesto and posters to display around the college to try and get people to vote for me!
I really want this job, as it involves communicating with the student body via twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms, as well as the student union website and possibly a magazine and radio station.
I think that I may actually be the only person who’s applied for that particular post, but I still need the votes to get elected and campaign week starts 10th October so I’ll blog again about my manifesto and how campaigning goes.
It anyone has run a campaign for a position on the student union or has any tips or general advice, please leave a comment!
Lally.
Category Education, Ramblings | Tags: , blackpool, campaign, College, communication, election, Fylde, officer, student, union, university, vote | 2 Comments
September 18, 2011 by lallyd
So.
A couple of weekends back, I attended Barcamp Media City, hosted by the BBC at Quay House. It was a brilliant Barcamp, despite a small hiccup with sleeping arrangements. I made lots of connections, got some great ideas for my dissertation and even appeared on an internal flyer promoting the event;
Click on it for the full size image.
The most exciting part of the entire weekend for me (perhaps second to the home made Yorkshire puddings on Sunday actually) was my attempt at a bit of stand up comedy! As part of a “mid-night surprise” the event organisers had booked a young comedian from Blackburn, who I’m not sure if anyone caught the name of?
However, he arrived late which was not a great start as far as the audience were concerned, and due to the change in sleeping arrangements many people had to leave by the time he arrived. I digress. So he had prepared a bit of material, none of which I thought was very topical but I chuckled a few times, but unfortunately felt disappointed by the over all performance. To be fair, most of the audience were drunk and he did get a few heckles, which went a bit too far and I think that toppled his confidence somewhat.
After the booked act finished, the “compere” (read: guy with the mic) asked if anyone else wanted to try there hand at a bit of stand up, and Dom (The Hodge) being the guy he is was cajoled into doing a 5 minute routine. By this point, I was on my 3rd bottle of Peroni and was feeling a bit brave, so started writing a bit of material whilst Dom was chatting away.
When Dom finished, nobody put themselves forward to go next, so I sheepishly put my hand up and on I went. I started with a joke which was a true story about my niece and what happened when my sister took her shopping for Tiger Balm. I told it because it really made me laugh when I heard it, and it was one of those “from the mouths of babes” type stories. To my utter surprise, other people found it funny too. That really spurred me on, so I just started talking about my life, and different observations that I’ve made about my 7 year old niece and the way she interacts with her friends. From there I got talking about my boyfriend and his obsession with his Mac-book Air and that seemed to resonate with the people in the room, about how attached they were to their computers and how hard it was to prize them away from just one more line of code. So I carried on with the geeky stuff, and talked a bit about how the Apple store sucks you in and you end up spending all your money on shiny stuff that you end up having to take to free events, because you’ve spent all your money in the Apple store!
I finished after what I think was about 5 or 10 minutes of material, but I got lots of laughs and an awesome round of applause at the end. I’ve never felt so high as I did when the adrenaline pulsed through my body after my mini-set.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem as though anyone recorded, or took pictures of me doing it, so I’m not sure whether I imagined it all in a sleep deprived stupor, but I sincerely hope not! The next day a few people commented on how funny they’d found me, which was really kind of them. So for me, Barcamp Media City was where I made my debut as a model and a comedienne and that’s something I’ll never forget. So thanks for the beers BBC!
Lally.
Category Events, Ramblings | Tags: , barcamp, barcampmediacity, BBC, bcmcuk, city, comedy, debut, media, stand up | No Comments