Member Article

York soap opera training supported by £30k cash injection

A soap opera developed by a York company to provide training for early years workers has been given a £30k boost from the Yorkshire Innovation Fund (YIF).

The drama-based learning programme, based on a fictional soap opera set in a small day nursery, was developed in September 2013 by Sue Overton Associates to support managers and supervisors through the introduction and development of staff supervisions.

The programme takes characters first developed by company founder Sue Overton and her team for a one-off residential weekend course for nursery leaders, and places them in a range of situations and settings within an ongoing storyline.

She says that the £30kYIF award from York St John University will enable the company to undertake vital research to help establish the value of drama-based learning and take the programme to the next level.

Her aim is to give the programme vital credibility that will encourage other organisations to rethink the way they develop employees.

She said: “The concept of learning through drama is already attracting a lot of interest from other organisations and sectors, including national children’s charities and the police force,”

“This funding will enable us to commission a formal study looking at the effectiveness of this learning style among early years workers and the positive impact it is having on children in day nurseries.”

Sue Overton Associates earlier received over £4,500 of first round funding to support a Small Innovation Project (SIP), which allowed them to review platforms which would take their face to face practises online.

Jenny Hall, creative business development manager at York St John, sits on the Yorkshire Innovation Fund awards panel on behalf of the University.

Jenny says this latest award takes the total York St John has given out under the YIF scheme to £120k.

She said: “YIF is designed to help companies fund the development of new ideas through collaborative projects between businesses and the region’s universities.

“Many new ideas require a blend of skills and expertise to get them off the ground, and working with a local university can help by giving businesses access to expertise, specialist equipment, facilities or new talent to develop those ideas. YIF funds this access.”

York St John University has awarded YIF financial support to projects across Yorkshire, including those in the creative, manufacturing learning, product design and business development sectors. The YIF fund is available for priority sectors for R&D and innovation projects, until July 2015.

YIF is an initiative of eleven Yorkshire and Humber universities, a partnership part-financed by the ERDF.

It gives Yorkshire & Humber SMEs in priority and eligible sectors access to the collective expertise of the region’s universities. For more information, visit www.yorkshireinnovationfund.org.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Clare Burnett .