Date: Monday 8th August 2011
Organised by: UCLan
Venue: UCLan, Preston
Post by: Lawrence Milner, Programme Officer
On Monday I attended the “Greener On the Outside” (Prisons) (GOOP) Project Board Meeting in Preston, chaired by Michelle Baybutt the Programme Lead for the Target: Wellbeing Prisons Programme.
“GOOP” is one of the three projects that make up our Pan-Regional Prisons Programme and provides opportunities for offenders to participate in environmental projects. As well as provide opportunities to improve their health, the project also gives prisoners the opportunity to develop their portfolio of transferable skills, gain work experience and contribute to the improvement of the local environment.
Reflecting the needs of different types of institutions and categories of prisoner, a wide range of activities have been taking place through the project such as growing flowers and vegetables within prison grounds, maintenance work out in the Community such as at Beacon Fell Country Park and distribution of community grow boxes. The work at
As the Target: Wellbeing Portfolio begins to draw to a close, work is taking place to ensure the future sustainability of projects. Building on the success of the current project, which has seen a number of prisoners use the skills learnt through GOOP to go on to grounds maintenance related professions on their release, UCLan are looking for potential opportunities to develop an exciting new Prison Training and Employment programme.
You can read more about the Prisons Programme here:
http://www.targetwellbeing.org.uk/profile/prisons
I just wanted to add that the Prisons Programme is an excellent, inspiring group of projects that's making a real difference, and that I will wholeheartedly support the programme in securing future resources. Good luck!
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