Friday Insights (24th January)

24 January 2020

Happy Friday!

Our project partners have been making major strides recently, so this week’s Friday Roundup will be focused on celebrating their fabulous starts to 2020: The Difference has become a major feature in the Evening Standard’s exclusions campaign, EasyPeasy are winning big at Bett and thinking deeply about advocacy, and we can finally share how freaking proud we are that The Lighthouse were recognized by Big Issue for the amazing work they’re doing for children in care.

The Difference in The Evening Standard

If you had a look at ES this week you probably spotted a familiar face front and centre – The Difference’s own Kiran Gill! ES is well into its month-long campaign raising awareness on the state of school exclusions in the UK, and this week they focused on Kiran and The Difference’s groundbreaking training for teachers. We’re so proud to be supporting Kiran and The Difference in their work to change the story on school exclusion, and we’re thrilled to see that ES agrees that supporting teachers and school leaders to better serve their vulnerable students is a crucial part of making inclusion a reality.


EasyPeasy winning big and fighting the good fight

The wonderful world of Bett arrived in London’s ExCel centre this week, and we have to commend them on their good taste – project partner EasyPeasy won a Bett Award in the category of Best Education Resource for Parents or Home Learning! This award is so incredibly well deserved and shows just how hard the EasyPeasy team have been working to support families and practitioners in playful learning. Congrats!


EasyPeasy’s Head of Partnerships, Andy Russell, also gave us some food for thought on advocacy recently via their LinkedIn blog piece. In it he lays out why EasyPeasy will be spending time in 2020 advocating for more spend in the early years –

“85% of a child’s brain is developed by age five and we never learn more or as quickly and easily than we do in those years…The majority of policies and debates around children are centred on formal education, which usually begins at age 5, missing the biggest window of opportunity for supporting child development.” 


EasyPeasy are in a unique position to advocate for an increase of resources to be allocated to early development – not only have they achieved impressive scale and partnerships in a short time, but, as Andy eloquently puts it, “the breadth of our work and relationships helps us to see and fight for the bigger picture in early years.” We’re proud to be supporting EasyPeasy to have the time and space to meaningfully and strategically advocate for this big change in early years – we look forward to seeing what happens!

The Lighthouse in Big Issue

Now that we’ve officially launched our new cohort of project partners, we can officially share how proud we are of The Lighthouse for their recognition in Big Issue’s Top 100 Changemakers in 2020! Lighthouse believes that children in care have the right to the same opportunities as everyone else – at home, school and in their communities. They’re working to make this a reality by creating children’s homes where children can thrive and where education is central to their holistic approach. Children in care need this support more than ever – you can read in The Guardian’s piece on the state of care for looked after children (LAC) that the number of LAC in the UK is at a 10 year high, and that our current residential care system needs serious attention. We’re proud to support The Lighthouse in bringing about big change for children in care, and commend Big Issue on their excellent taste!