Last week we welcomed three students for the Centre for Leadership Performance’s ‘Dream Placement’ work experience week.  The dream placement programme is designed to support our county’s talented young people in gaining experience in industry and business, and to help them make informed choices about their future careers. We enjoyed taking part in the initial training, interview and selection process and were looking forward to welcoming the students into CAfS!

Our three students, Samia, Sophie and Olivia, joined us at various points across the week. Activities ranged from project work with our partners at CDEC to tree planting, looking at grant applications and working with our marketing team to tell the stories of those involved in the sustainability network. You can read an interview that Sophie and Olivia carried out here with Imogen Barnfather, who is using the theatre to spread the message of sustainability. More interviews will follow over on the Zero Carbon Cumbria site – so keep an eye out.

We also held a Climate Fresk with them – Climate Fresk is a card-based activity, designed to explore links between the causes and consequences of climate change in a collective manner that encourages conversation and discussion. You can find out more about Climate Fresk work here.

Working in group activities and asking for their input in a variety of CAfS projects not only gave them a breadth of experience, but also allowed us to hear their concerns and have time to share what some of the connections and impacts that climate change can have on their lives.

John Forbes, Project Manager from Zero Carbon Cumbria explains the importance of the project:

We firmly believe in giving young people in Cumbria every opportunity to make informed choices about their career – Dream Placement gives them the chance to do just that, and it has been a privilege to be part of it; gaining a different perspective on the work we do, and sharing the enthusiasm and opportunities.  As part of the National Lottery funded Zero Carbon Cumbria project, we have been delighted to work with Centre for Leadership Performance to help raise the profile of careers linked to climate change and the wider environmental sector and are looking forward to offering more placements next year.

We hope to see more of Olivia, Samia and Sophie in the future  –  and watch this space for future work placement projects!