World Mental Health Day Friday, October 8, 2010 - 17:34

NIACE's joint Skills Funding Agency (SFA) project - to establish a Learning and Skills Mental Health e-Community of Practice - will be of interest to a range of groups like teachers, learning support staff, mental health workers, employment services, learners, mental health service users, carers and policy makers.

The ‘e-community' will provide members with opportunities to share good practice, support quality improvement in their provision and stimulate debate to inform policy. The project will enable NIACE and the SFA to continue supporting the regional mental health learning and skills networks and build on the work of the Learning and Skills Council Mental Health Strategy; which ceased at the end of March 2010.

NIACE has had a commitment over the last ten years to improving the connections between education and health care to better support people with mental health difficulties.

Formal and informal learning opportunities can be an important part of people's personal recovery journeys, helping people to develop their confidence and wellbeing. Many Adult Learners' Week award winners have provided powerful examples of how learning has helped them to transform their lives:

Mark Beaton, aged 44, fought his way back from mental and physical illness, homelessness and unemployment to excel as a student, while also starting his own business as a sports massage therapist.

Even as he struggled to gain new skills and build the self-confidence he had lacked all his life, Mark was diagnosed with carpal tunnel syndrome which threatened the manual dexterity he needed for the practical skills to succeed. Undeterred, after an operation, he embarked on the City & Guilds Level 3 Diploma in Body Massage, graduating from Morley College, London, in 2009 with distinctions in both the theory and practical exams and completed his Sports Massage Diploma in the same year. He came off benefits and got advice and training to set-up his own business.

Mark said:

"Adult education has not only given me the chance for a career change, at 44, it has given me a total life change."

Alan Tuckett, Chief Executive of NIACE, said:

"There is no more important thing affecting businesses than mental health. With one in four people affected by mental health issues at some point during their lives, the cost to individuals, families, communities, society and business is enormous. The Foresight study of 2009 highlighted that learning is one of five key components for maintaining good health and as Secretary of State at BIS, Vince Cable, underlined in his first ministerial speech after being elected, adult learning provides a space that offers dignity for rebuilding lives."

In his first ministerial speech after being elected, Vince Cable, Secretary of State at BIS, said:

"My mother was a housewife and when I was ten she had a major nervous breakdown and spent time in a mental hospital. When she recovered she saved her mind through adult education - learning for the first time about history, literature, philosophy and art. We need more people like her too."

Catina Barrett, Senior Project Officer for Mental Health at NIACE, said:

"Although progress has been made in recent years, we still have much to do. We need to continue to be aspirational for people with mental health difficulties; need to involve and advocate with them for improved public policy. We also need to improve the quality of our learning and skills services and our local partnership working to support and sustain their recovery and enable them to discover and fulfil their potential."

To further improve learning opportunities for adults with mental health difficulties, NIACE has recently launched its new mental health prospectus for 2010/11, offering public and in-house training and featuring the following during October:

• Mental Health Matters for Learning and Skills training; and
• Joint LSIS workshops - Career learning for the 21st century: Providing Information, Advice and Guidance (IAG) for people with a mental health condition.

To find out about the joint LSIS workshop or to attend, email enquiries@lsis.org.uk or call 02476627953.

NIACE is also in the process of establishing a new special interest group for NIACE members. The group will explore strategic issues around learning and skills and mental health, including workforce mental health and wellbeing.

For more information about NIACE's mental health work and to help us develop the new e-community of practice, email mentalhealth@niace.org.uk.