The Easter holidays have brought a number of super experiences and workshops for our Step Up Move On students at their University of Hull visits this week.
Monday saw the Year 7 young people having a day in the life of a university student wit a visit to The Courtyard Accommodation and some cooking with Cook Stars! On seeing the facilities, one young man said that he felt so proud as it was the first time he had ever cooked anything. Another said he could definitely see himself living in the flats with some friends and going to university. He even took his shoes off and got into bed and was planning on where to put his Xbox. We then planned a healthy ‘Meal on a Budget’ cooking a Chinese style vegetable rice and a fruit sponge pudding in the shared kitchen. They even enjoyed the washing up.
We were also lucky enough to meet Jinx, Lola and Pepper the Therapy Dogs from Underdogs International who came with their owners Tanya, Toni and Richard to show us some new tricks and explain the great job they do supporting reading in primary schools.
On Tuesday a group of mixed Year 8s and 10s were visited by Hobson & Porter to discover all of the different career options available in the construction industry. Our young people became architects, project leaders and quality surveyors for the day whilst they took part in the ‘Build a School Challenge’! They worked as a team and overcame their worries to present their ideas to the rest of the group. Thank you to Jacquie Blades and Victoria Fussey for a super workshop.
In the afternoon we were joined by Hull FC player, Lauren Sutton who shared her journey and we discovered the enormous amount of jobs in the sport! We ended with an intensely motivating session of wheelchair rugby with Mike. It was fantastic and we had so much fun!
Wednesday brought Year 9 to the University to find out about another fascinating occupation in theatre! Ed Grimoldby from theatre company ‘From Below’ told the students how he uses swords, juggling, LED lights and fire to create his amazing physical theatre productions. He showed the young people his techniques and they all had a go at poi juggling! It’s a lot harder than it looks but some of them showed some real skill!
Our final workshop of the week was a super fun sales workshop with Service Now. The group were split into two teams and gained skills in design, marketing and sales to produce some amazing tower structures and PowerPoint presentations. Thank you to Max Scales, Lois England and Joe Humphries for inspiring the young people to try new things and consider different career pathways.
We definitely sparked the imaginations of the young people this week and we love collaborating with people who have the same passion as to inspire future generations.