Introducing Livability Millie College

Ashley Williams

14/06/22

Livability Millie College is a new college for students 16 years+. Catering for young adults with a wide range of needs linked to social and emotional barriers, Autistic Spectrum Condition, learning difficulties and physical disabilities in our Bournemouth, Christchurch, Poole and Dorset areas.

Livability Education is launching a new 16 years+ college across two sites; Livability Holton Lee a wellbeing and enterprise campus and a smaller community campus, based in Poole.

Our vision is to offer a bespoke, tailored approach to learning delivered through skills based programmes for young adults with a wide range of additional needs. This exciting new provision sets out to meet three strategic aims; supporting lifelong learning for all, enabling high-quality education and supporting young people to live safe and independent lives.

To realise our strategic aim of lifelong learning for all, Millie College will be looking to develop work place opportunities through the enterprise curriculum, which provides opportunities for work place skills to be grown and for our learners to have meaningful and purposeful activity into their adult lives. Millie College will be encouraging partnerships with local companies and organisations which support accessible work activities.

Adele Audin, Director for Education

To help provide the solution for an age range that often falls through the gap, the college is designed to support three separate cohorts, 16+, 19+ and 25+ with the overarching ethos of enterprise at the core. Added to this is the chance for each learner to experience a variety of activities creating a great opportunity for growth and development.

Millie College aims to help young people with disabilities with a skills-based approach, leading to self-advocacy. This ensures a successful transition to the next phase of their lives, through a focus on 4 key areas:

Personal Development and Wellbeing; developing independence and resilience with clear progression frameworks
Functional Life Skills; skills for life, literacy and numeracy and applying these to daily life and in the local community that support accreditation
Community Links; fostering links with the local community recreational activities, support groups and local organisations for the learners to explore
Enterprise and the World of Work; developing a focus on future life activities that have purpose and meaning to the individual, building job opportunities with local businesses, companies and corporations, including work activity, placements and employment i.e. job coaching, job sharing or volunteering, alongside internships, apprenticeships and traineeships

Our features of success will be measured through our learner’s personal learning journey, their independence, choice and control, built on the foundation of emotional health and wellbeing. There will be a wide variety of activities for learners to participate in each day including animal care, catering, horticulture, nature walks and creative arts plus the benefit of woodland classrooms at our 350 acre Holton Lee campus.