Between 12th – 13th December 2015, Future Foundations headed to Cambridge for a two day, transformational residential training programme with high achieving students from Luton Sixth Form College.
‘Bright Futures’ was a Higher Education experience held at Churchill College, Cambridge for 30 of the most able Year 12 students. The programme was designed to raise their aspirations and awareness of Higher Education by experiencing student life at a College in Cambridge.
Young people stayed in University halls of residence, explored the city centre’s famous landmarks and colleges and expanded their horizons with encouragement and guidance of Future Foundations’ experienced coaches. Over the course of two days they carried out an intensive series of experiential learning sessions and challenges to develop their leadership skills and increase confidence, teamwork and to enable them to take responsibility for their future.
The Bright Futures programme was Course Directed by Andy Dunn and our Future Foundations coaches were Chetna Bhatt, Laurence Alliston-Grenier and Fran Davenport.
- Enable students to discover what they can study at university, tuition style and student lifestyle.
- Encourage students to take personal responsibility for their futures; to be proactive in their approach to their studies and the future benefits of doing so.
- Help the students to understand what it means to be a leader
- Communicate the importance of leadership and the future leadership needs for society
- Foster the belief that with gifts/talents come a responsibility to use them for the better of others
- Open students’ minds to goal setting and equip them with time management skills
Churchill College, which received its Royal Charter in 1960, is the national and Commonwealth memorial to Sir Winston Churchill. It is the embodiment of his vision of how higher education can benefit society in the modern age. Like the thirty other colleges in Cambridge University, it is committed to outstanding academic achievement; more than twenty of its members have won the Nobel Prize.
Open, friendly, progressive and outward-looking, Churchill also builds bridges to the wider community. It pioneered the entry of women to all-male colleges. It seeks and welcomes able students who might not otherwise aspire to come to Cambridge.
Andy Dunn
“It has been a great privilege to course direct this programme and witness such a transformational change in young people over the course of such a short time. The sixth formers that left us on Sunday evening were a bonded, confident and energised team who embraced every challenge we presented them with. They should all be truly proud of their achievement and personal growth and I am sure the networks of support and toolkit of skills (confidence, self-leadership, assertiveness and communication) they have acquired will give them a huge advantage and inform their academic and career choices over the coming years.
My highlight from the weekend were seeing the young people blossom during the group activities such as the Big Debate and Cambridge Factor. The Cambridge Factor is an epic team race around the city competing with other students to collect points by stepping outside their comfort zone. We even had one team hijacking the microphone of a street protest to promote the Luton Sixth Form College programme on social media!”
A huge thank you to Churchill College, Luton Sixth Form College and all the parents and student that made this programme possible. We look forward to Bright Futures 2016!