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Learning from the Past – Skilled for the Future
In partnership with the Museum of East Anglian Life in Stowmarket, Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse has been awarded over £600,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund’s Skills for the Future programme to deliver a training project between 2011 and 2014.
This project provides an opportunity for young people and adults from different backgrounds to develop skills and knowledge in a specific area of traditional skills. Where possible, learning will be tied to accredited qualifications. This will give the trainees both work experience and training, and will be a good stepping stone for further opportunities in the heritage or historic environment sector.
At Gressenhall we are offering a number of formal apprenticeships in such areas as traditional farming and horticulture in partnership with Easton College. We will also be offering 6-12 month internships that will be targeted at both young people and second careerers. These will be based around areas such as heritage gardening, woodland & heritage land management, rural collections management and interpretation, and managing historic buildings.
Trainees will work alongside staff and volunteers under the supervision of a project officer. Mentoring and career development support will also be provided. For people not sure what area they wish to specialise in there is a yearly programme of 3 month traditional skills “taster” courses running at the Museum of East Anglian Life.
A film was created featuring some of the trainees during the first six months of the project. It was produced for the official launch in October 2011. For ease, the film has been divided into two chapters, which can be accessed via the following links on YouTube: part one and part two.
For more information about the range of internships and apprenticeships available, please see the documents at the bottom of this page.
If you would like more information on the work taking place at the Museum of East Anglian Life, please see the Skills for the Future page on their website.
Trainmail – for all the latest news
The March 2012 edition of Trainmail – our Skills for the Future newsletter – is now available to download.
Please see the link at the bottom of the page.
Trainmail is published quarterly and details all the recent news from the project at both Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse and the Museum of East Anglian Life.
Project Update
In September 2011 Oscar began his Heritage Farming Apprenticeship at Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse. He works on the museum farm learning how to look after the rare breed sheep, pigs, cattle, goats, ducks, turkeys, chickens, and Suffolk Punch horses. Working with the Suffolk Punch horses is a key area of Oscar’s training. He is learning how to plough and harvest the fields using horse drawn equipment, and is demonstrating this to the public and to schools too as part of his work with visitors.
Oscar says:
“I’ve been here three months now, and going to Easton College each week to learn more about modern farming techniques. I’ve just been on my chainsaw course at the college too. On the more traditional side I have tried my hand at a wide range of skills that would have been practised in the Victorian era. Most of these are centred on working the horses to carry out different tasks, from minor jobs such as mucking out the paddocks to much more skilled jobs such as ploughing and potato spinning.
When I started here I had no experience of working with horses at all. Even being able to control the horses in a simple way has been a real learning curve for me and one I have thoroughly enjoyed. I have also used the horses to hoe the turnips using a scuffler, harrow the muck on the paddocks as well as harrowing the ploughed land.
Other jobs on the farm have included bringing in the sheaves from the field where they were harvested and then processing them in the thrashing drum on Apple Day.
I get the chance to join in with some of the other Skills for the Future trainees from time to time, as with some hedge-laying training and I’ll be doing some fruit tree pruning with a local expert in the new year.”
New trainees for January 2012 are Helen who will work in the museum archive and library, and also Alex, the Apprentice Farrier. Updates from them will be available in the spring.
Interested in becoming a trainee?
Throughout 2012 Gressenhall Farm and Workhouse will be recruiting several more Skills for the Future trainees.
When recruitment is underway, you will be able to download information and application forms from this website.
If you would like to be kept informed of all future opportunities, please contact the Skills for the Future Project Officer Sally Ackroyd on sally.ackroyd@norfolk.gov.uk and ask to be added to the mailing list.
Our partner Museum, the Museum of East Anglian Life is also recruiting. See their website for more information, or contact paul.palmer@eastanglianlife.org.uk
Heritage Gardening opportunities
Our current Skills for the Future Heritage Gardening Trainees are in their final few months with us, and we are now recruiting for the next two.
Starting in July, we will be employing two people, one a part time Heritage Gardening Trainee, and one a full time Heritage Gardening Apprentice.
You will find information about the part time Trainee post on this website. Please see the poster and applicant pack below. To download a copy of the application form for this post, please click here.
For information about the full time Apprenticeship post, including details on how to apply, please see Norfolk County Council’s recruitment website.
We expect both posts to work together and support each other in their training where they can.
The full time post is an Apprenticeship, including attendance at Easton College one day per week to complete a NVQ level 2 in Horticulture.
The part time post will not have time within their traineeship to attend college, but support will be given if you wish to undertake a relevant course in your own time.
Read more
- Heritage Gardening Apprentice - Job Description (pdf - 30kB)
- Heritage Gardening Trainee - Advert (pdf - 318kB)
- Heritage Gardening Trainee - Applicant pack (pdf - 370kB)
- Skills for the Future information leaflet (pdf - 2617kB)
- Skills for the Future training posts - information (update January 2012) (pdf - 42kB)
- Train Mail - Issue 1 - September 2011 (pdf - 719kB)
- Train Mail - Issue 2 - December 2011 (pdf - 1170kB)
- Train Mail - Issue 3 - March 2012 (pdf - 1155kB)
- Update - Heritage Gardening trainees (pdf - 50kB)
Our only regret is that we ran out of time as there was so much to do.
Our two youngsters love the place…The exhibits just go on and on and you really can't see it all in the day….I can't speak highly enough of the whole experience.
Leaflets & files to print
