DIVERSITY FAIR AT SOUTH LEICESTERSHIRE COLLEGE

Today South Leicestershire College is hosting its Diversity Fair - the climax of the college's Diversity Week. Leicester Council of Faiths was involved earlier in the week, when we offered a Faiths Panel for staff and students, Tuesday lunchtime. Today we put on display our full range of pop-up banners in an airy, bright and colourful alcove - just the kind of space I had in mind for the exhibition when it was created more than four years ago, though we've never been able to show it off in such a setting till today. We also have the two banners that we seem to have inherited from the University of Leicester: Mapping Faith and Place in Leicester and the Leicester Faith Trail.

In the photos above, Tony Nelson (Leicester Hebrew Congregation and Treasurer of Leicester Council of Faiths) is sitting with Humera Aziz (Learner Welfare Adviser, Brooksby Melton College). Humera and her colleague Nicola Welbourne were behind the Interfaith Events Day at Brooksby Melton College during Inter Faith Week last November, which we supported (see my blog entry for that event). I'd invited Humera to pop over and have a look at what was being done here today. Thanks to Zulqar Muhammad for showing Humera round the college during her brief visit this morning.

In the photo above, I'm with Ravinder Kaur from Leicestershire County Council's LWA: Living Without Abuse project. Ravinder did a stint on our exhibition in Highcross during Inter Faith Week 2012. LWA has its own display but Ravinder is good enough to sit a spell on our exhibition, late in the day.

Exhibiting downstairs:

• Charnwood Arts
• Choose My Support
• Helping Hands
• Jasmine House
• LAMP
• Royal Marines
• Trade Sexual Health
• Voluntary Action LeicesterShire

Exhibiting upstairs in The Eating Place:

• 2FUNKYarts
• Akwaaba Ayeh Mental Health Advocacy Project
• Gypsy And Traveller Equality (GATE)
• Headway
• Kaine Arts Community Education Management
• Labelled
• Leicestershire Aids Support Service (LASS)
• Leicestershire Police Prevent Engagement Team
• LWA: Living Without Abuse
• The Conservation Volunteers
• The Learning Support Centre
• The Race Equality Centre (TREC)

There's a Diversity Tucker Trail, allowing visitors to sample foods of different cultural origins. All nice and tasty - not to be confused with any other kind of "tucker trail" of which you may have heard!

Students can complete a Diversity Week Quiz as they make their way round the exhibits, with the chance to win high street shopping vouchers. Here are the multiple choice questions:

1. What does LGBT stand for?

• Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transexual
• Leicestershire Genital Bereavement Team
• Lesbian Gay Boxing Team

2. How many faiths are included in the Council of Faiths Leicester?

• 6
• 8
• 9

3. How many Eids do Muslims celebrate each year?

• 2
• 1
• 5

4. How many people do you think are effected [sic] by mental ill health?

• 1 in 10
• 1 in 6
• 1 in 4

5. What percentage of disabled people are born with their disability?

• 17%
• 56%
• 70%

6. What do these three celebrities have in common: Orlando Bloom; Keira Knightley; Mohammed Ali?

• Fear of spiders
• Dyslexia
• Asthma

7. Ramadan is?

• The first day of the Chinese New Year
• A month of fasting for Muslims
• The Hindu Festival of Lights

8. Which of the following is NOT protected by anti-discrimination law?

• Age
• Obesity
• Race
• Sex
• Sexual orientation
• Religion
• Disability
• Transgenderism

9. Diversity means?

• Celebrating and valuing difference
• Treating everyone the same
• Targeting help at individual groups

10. What minimum font size does the National Institute for the Blind recommend for user in printed public documents?

• 8-10 points [sic]
• 12-14 points
• 24+ points

Around 12 noon, Free lunches are distributed to everyone on the stalls. This leads to a classic diversity moment, when a Muslim hands a Jew their lunch bag containing a packet of Smoky Bacon crisps. There's nothing derived from a pig in these crisps of course; there's no meat content whatsoever since they are labelled as suitable for vegetarians. But it's the thought that counts - how we did laugh!

Now, if I had an award of my own to give for the best single part of the whole exhibition, I'd give it to The Conservation Volunteers, for their pop-up banner shown in the photo below.

On a personal note, walking the 20 minutes or so from my flat to the college this morning, I felt in need of a morale booster. By the time I was only a few minutes from my endpoint, I thought I'd hit Shuffle Songs on my iPod Classic, just to see which tune it might give me to set me up for the day. Of all the things it could have chosen, it offered up Eple by Royksopp, from their 2001 album Melody A.M. How lovely! I couldn't have chosen better myself - that tune always brings a smile to my face and puts a spring in my step. I've included the link to the video on the band's official website. The song itself is wonderfully bouncy and upbeat but the video is the most startlingly mind-bending experience. I've watched the video dozens of times over several years and will never get my head round it. It's unique - and it's probably my favourite music video ever. The more people watch it, the happier we shall be - click on the song title a few lines above, faithful reader, and feel the benefit.

FAITHS PANEL AT SOUTH LEICESTERSHIRE COLLEGE

It's Diversity Week at South Leicestershire College. Leicester Council of Faiths has been asked to make two contributions. On Thursday we'll be displaying our full range of pop-up banners for the whole day. Today, we're providing a "Faith Panel" to chat with staff and students.

Our panel is scheduled for lunchtime (1200-1400) so where better to set up than in the college cafeteria, which goes under the name of The Eating Place. This turns out to be an informal, easy-going couple of hours during which we get the chance to talk to a good number of interested (and interesting) people about our beliefs - and theirs.

I hope you can see our visit went well from the photo above: (at back) Helen Saunderson (Humanist); Kym Moore (staff member of SLC Equality & Diversity Group); Jan McDonald (Bahá'í); Sheila Markham (Leicester Hebrew Congregation); (in front) Brendan Grimley (Vocational Mentor, SLC staff); Zulqarnain Muhammad (staff member of SLC Equality & Diversity Group).

PLANNING FOR DIVERSITY WEEK AT SOUTH LEICESTERSHIRE COLLEGE

A meeting this morning with Zulqa Muhammad, Learning Coach at South Leicestershire College. The college is planning a Diversity Week involving students and staff, Monday 28 to Friday 1 January 2013.

Zulqa saw our exhibition in Highcross during Inter Faith Week at the end of November and has asked if the Council of Faiths could get involved. He shares the draft programme with me; it covers a variety of the Protected Characteristics that you'd expect to find on campus, including disability, LGBT, race and religion. The college has a strong and active Equality and Diversity Group which covers these themes and others, as expressed in the college's Equality and Diversity scheme. 

We're asked to provide participants from different faith backgrounds for what's described as a "Religious Speed Dating" session around lunchtime on the Tuesday. We're also being asked to bring along our full exhibition for the Thursday, which will be the busiest day of the week.

I offer our two "generic" banners for the whole of the week, along with the two banners from Leicester University ("Mapping Faith and Place in Leicester" and "Leicester Faith Trail") which are still in our possession after we used them at Inter Faith Week. We might lend a couple of blu-rays of movies that featured in our Faiths Film Festival at Phoenix Square during Inter Faith Week 2011.

The dates for the college's Diversity Week will allow the event to be listed as being keyed to World Interfaith Harmony Week, which begins on Friday 1 February.

We should be able to help the college get some decent exposure for their Diversity Week through social media and by our contact with Citizens' Eye Community News Agency and Civic Leicester (among others). A the very least, I should be able to pop in each day and film a few video snippets on my flip camera that could be uploaded to their sites and to Facebook, Twitter etc.

The photo above shows the space in the college concourse that'll be given to the Council of Faiths full exhibition on the Thursday of their Diversity Week. It's the kind of alcove setting I've long wanted to see it in.

NATIONAL COUNCIL OF FAITHS & BELIEFS IN FURTHER EDUCATION: REGIONAL FORUM

At South Leicestershire College (South Wigston Campus), this afternoon for the East Midlands Regional Forum of the National Council of Faiths and Beliefs in Further Education. There are 14 attendees at this relatively short meeting, representing a range of institutions and services:

• Christians Aware
• East Midlands Centre for Excellence in Teacher Training (EMCETT)
• Gateway College
• Grantham College
• Lincolnshire Chaplaincy Services
• North Nottinghamshire College
• Portland College
• South Leicestershire College
• South Nottingham College
• Wyggeston & Queen Elizabeth I College

I've been invited to attend this meeting by Kevin Commons and Ian Grayling of the Leicester Serene Reflection Meditation Group, who have organised the spring term courses for Christians Aware's Faith Awareness Programme, which have been a staple of this blog over the years (see blog entries passim). Kevin and Ian are, respectively, giving two of the three presentations in this afternoon's programme:

• "Mindfulness, Morality and Wisdom": A programme for adult education and chaplaincy presented by Kevin Commons (EMCETT Associate)
• "It's the Curriculum, Stupid": A joint SMSC paper produced by EMCETT and fbfe presented by Ian Grayling (Executive Director, EMCETT)
• "Handling Controversial Issues with Students": Curriculum development initiatives from fbfe presented by John Wise (Chief Executive, fbfe)

Today's meeting is held in the college's Multi-Faith Centre. The Centre serves as the home of South Wigston United Reform Church - part of the South Leicestershire Group of the URC, formed in 1986. The group consists of six churches - three former Congregational and three former Churches of Christ -  working together, sharing resources and ministry, although each of the six churches retains its individual identity. 

Relocation of South Leicestershire College required the demolition of older properties on the site of what would become the new campus. The congregation of the United Reform Church (originally founded on this site in 1886) accepted the challenges and the opportunities offered by moving into the college and sharing the Multi-Faith Centre with students and staff and worshippers from other background, faiths and traditions. It is now known as the Church in the College (or, as Rev. Richard Eastman put it today, "The Church in the Cupboard").

This is the first time I've been in the new premises of South Leicestershire College. The college (and its predecessor, Wigston College) used to be located across the road from where I lived further up the hill on Station Road. That campus was sold and the site razed to the ground a couple of years ago. The site stands empty today, despite having been announced at one time that it was to be a site for multi-bedroom executive homes, at another for a new health centre. I took my Professional Certificate in Education there back in 2005. Ian Grayling was my mentor on that course.