Monthly Archives: December 2009

The success of volunteers on Liverpool Lighthouse’s Volunteer Programme and Business in the Community’s ‘Back to Work’ programme was celebrated Friday11th December. The volunteers were joined by some of the businesses involved in the project in King’s Hall Auditorium.

Business in the Community teamed up with Liverpool Lighthouse and other businesses in Liverpool to help people who had struggled with addictions, crime and homelessness to get back into work. The scheme gave the candidates an opportunity to gain some work experience through volunteering and in some cases has lead to permanent work within that organisation.

At the celebration, Liverpool Lighthouse’s long term volunteer, Tommy Fielding gave a very emotional account of his life before he started the volunteer programme. He read aloud his self written, heart-felt poem that expressed his story. Thanks were given by BITC programme leader, Alison Gibon and Liverpool Lighthouse’s Community Development Manager, Sheila McCormack.

Liverpool Lighthouse continues to work with BITC and is currently developing its volunteer programme and recruiting more people. If you’re interested in becoming a volunteer and would like to join the programme contact us on 0151 476 2342 or email us info@liverpoollighthouse.com

Students on the Harmonize alternative education programme at Liverpool Lighthouse are rehearsing this week for their forthcoming musical production of ‘Fame’ being performed at Liverpool Lighthouse 16th December at 12pm.

The students adaptation of the famous West End Musical includes songs from the energetic and passionate well loved show. It will take you through the ups and downs and hardships of making it.

The Harmonize students are using their urban arts skills to put their creative stamp onto their production of ‘Fame’ for public enjoyment. We hope you can join us on Wednesday 16th December at 12pm.
Tickets are free. For further details please contact us on 0151 476 2342

Liverpool Lighthouse celebrated the graduation of 37 students from their ESOL (English for speakers of other languages) course on Friday 4th December. The group who hail from 17 different countries, has spent the last 12 weeks working towards their nationally recognised ESOL with integrated music, craft and IT qualification.

The NLDC funded programme, has seen students from Brazil, Thailand, China, Africa and Poland (to name but a few) graduate successfully. Liverpool Lighthouse ESOL training is currently leading the way; with two of its graduates taking part in a pilot ICV programme that no other organisation is currently doing. This involved producing an electronic and multi media version of their CV that can be easily sent anywhere in the world as part of a job application. The innovative idea came from Liverpool Lighthouse’s visionary, Dr Tani Omideyi. The video based CV’s aim is to provide a creative platform for the individuals to effectively promote themselves anywhere in the world and to increase their career opportunities.

This year’s students celebrated with foods of the world and live music in Bliss Bistro at Liverpool Lighthouse. Each graduate brought along food from their country to share with the other candidates .

Senior Manager of Training and Compliance, Marie McConville says “The students have worked hard to achieve this goal and we’re very proud of them all. I’d like to thank NLDC for their continued support that helps students not to just learn English but to integrate into the community and enhance their lives.”

An audience of young people were privy to a performance about gun and knife crime yesterday. The play ‘Terriers’ that was performed in Liverpool Lighthouse’s Kings Hall Auditorium was part of a local tour organized by Merseyside Police as an initiative to educate secondary school pupils through theatre.

The hard hitting, professional play was written especially for the Merseyside school tour by local writer Maurice Bessman whose credits have included countless BBC television productions, radio plays and national and local theatre productions.

‘Terriers’ was commissioned by Merseyside Police in 2008 and was shown to 1,500 young people at 22 Merseyside schools in March this year. After outstanding feedback the project developed and has now just finished its month long tour of 40 secondary schools in Liverpool and Kowsley where gun and knife crime are a part of real life for some of its audience. Up to 20,000 young people have watched the show, with Liverpool Lighthouse audience being the last.
The 6 young professional actors play rival gang members in Liverpool. The story sees the pressure and moral dilemmas put upon the young crew members and the detrimental effects their decisions have on their lives and the lives of others. The production doesn’t end at the curtain call however, schools are provided with a CD Rom of the script and production to engage them in follow up discussion work.

Artistic director and Producer Miriam Mussa says “We’ve had an overwhelming positive response from the school audiences we’ve taken ‘Terriers’ to. They seem to relate to the characters well and the most common comment is how realistic the production is. Maurice Bessman is a fantastic writer who never patronises his audience, making it easy for the young audience to relate to the characters. We will continue to evaluate the impact of this tour but so far we’ve seen that using theatre in education is far more effective than police officers going into schools and giving talks about how not to get into gangs.”