Adult Education in Durham
Education does not necessarily stop after leaving the school. As the individual gets older, as the technology catches speed, as the nature of work changes, the entire society gets benefited by refreshing itself with certain education, no matter how much is the age. Whether one wants to equip himself for some job, stretching in body and mind, or even making some interesting friendships, the Durham County Council has programmes arranged for meeting all the interests. So, Durham people, just chill! Do not repent because you could not complete your education at the school-going age.
The adult education programme in Durham has been running successfully in six regions so far: They are North Durham, Sedge field Area, Dales Area, Central Durham, and Easing ton Area. Off late, a survey was carried out regarding the overwhelming response given to this programme. Some astonishing facts have come up. Some of them are improving the self-esteem, confidence, job prospects, number, writing, reading, and computer skills, and last, but not the least, helping the children with homework. This truly proves the saying, “Learning has no age limits”.
The other reason behind this is choice out of several subjects including the following:
Obtaining qualifications in English and Maths
One can obtain qualification in English or Maths up to level one or two. He needs to prepare for the National Test which is paper based or online.
Improving numeracy and literacy through IT
One can brush up his Maths and English skills by making use of computer. New learners are the most welcome.
Dyslexia SOS
This course consists of ‘awareness about dyslexia and methods of supporting the dyslexic patients’.
Family Learning
Children and their parents are provided opportunities to gain learning experiences, both-at the home as well as school level. Here, parents are taught to support the children with numeracy and literacy. In the due course, they learn to improve their (own) skills as well.
Careers advice
This programme facilitates free guidance regarding training, jobs, and courses.
Language crash courses in Spanish, Italian, German, and French
There are crash courses available for the above languages. They might consist of 40 days.
In addition to all these, there is a wide spectrum of art courses offered. These courses include stitching, weaving, tailoring, handicrafts (cross-stitch), etc. The fitness freaks can opt for yoga certification courses. There are also courses related to gymnastics, aerobatics, and athletics.
Extra-curricular activities
Activity Centers
There are three outdoor centers for learning, running on the residential basis. They form a part of ‘Outdoor and Sustainability Service (OASES)’ of County Durham. They are ‘earls Orchard Center for Outdoor Learning’, ‘The Westgate Center’, and ‘The Middleton Center’. Their functions include Encouraging the continued use of learning whose base would be out-of-the-classroom training, and also encouraging children of making use of opportunities that they are offered, developing understanding and knowledge by the way of first-hand growing and farming experience, raising awareness about the place of procuring the food, proper lifestyle choices, and encouraging a better responsibility sense for environment on global and local scale.