Voices of Change: Stand Up! Workshops Inspire Across London and Manchester

This month, Stand Up! were pleased to increase their reach in London, Greater London as well as in Manchester. At Hazel Grove school in Manchester, Aimee saw 11 year 7 forms to run anti-bullying workshops for them. The students and staff welcomed and received the team and workshops very well. Our partnership with Hazel Grove is long lasting and the school have incorporated the workshops into their annual curriculum. Furthermore, these workshops contributed to Stand Up’s Manchester reach which is an important part of our funding requirements from the Harold Hyam Wingate Foundation.

At Watford Grammar School for Girls the team delivered workshops for the entire year 9 and 12 cohorts, delivering anti-discrimination workshops to the year 9s and media and propaganda sessions for the year 12s. The team were pleased to deliver effective sessions for each form groups, with a great level of interest and participation from the students. Finally, at Blackheath High School, Aimee delivered anti-bullying sessions for the year 7s who engaged with the sessions fantastically. In total, the team saw 870 students across 28 Stand Up! workshops at 3 schools.

In addition to the Stand Up! sessions delivered in May, the team collaborated on the fourth and

final Alan Senitt Upstanders Leadership Programme seminars, hosted at Copthall School and JCOSS. Each of the two seminars engaged 5 school teams of 10 participants. The team were lucky to welcome speakers from Everyone’s Invited to the seminars, a charity dedicated to exposing and eradicating rape culture with empathy, compassion and understanding. The themes of the seminar were regarding the potential impact and effect of social action projects as well as preparation for graduation, which included a speech-writing workshop.

Education and Regional Lead, Karl was fortunate to be invited to the Conference on antisemitism in Manchester schools, hosted by the Jewish Representative Council, Lord Mann and the Jewish Leadership Council. This was an opportunity to network with anti-discrimination partners as well as teachers at Manchester schools who are committed to tackling this issue.