Education4Democracy

'A Talking Shop or A Doing Shop?’: Education4Democracy NE Explained

EDUCATION4DEMOCRACY NE is a not-for-profit, party neutral community interest company based in the city of Newcastle, but operating across the region. Founded in late 2015 by Stephen Lambert, a social entrepreneur, the organisation is supported by a 15-strong Advisory Board, drawn from the world of government, further education, academia, business, charities, health, community development and young people.

Education4Democracy NE is a member of Newcastle CVS and the NE Social Enterprise Partnership.

Stephen said: '' There's clearly a need for this type of project in the North East given that a significant section of the population feel that civic affairs or the decision-making process has no impact on their lives. What the region is experiencing is a crisis of  democratic engagement with falling turn-out in elections, hundreds of thousands not registered to vote and only a minority participating actively in civil life'.

'' Our main aim, using our team of qualified  and experienced volunteers, is to reach out to those sections of the community who feel alienated from day-to-day politics including young adults, people with learning disabilities or mental health issues, working-class women and the disadvantaged,''  Stephen added.

The organisation provides the following services to help boost ''active citizenship'' across the North East:

• Citizenship Education in schools, colleges and community groups: Making sense of the democratic process - voting; civic participation; pressure groups; political parties; the judicial system; layers of governance from the Parish Council to the EU; the role of elected representatives and the changing British constitution.
• Understanding and challenging political extremism: workshops  on religious fundamentalism and extremism, the Far Right and the Far left
• Equality and diversity : the bases of discrimination and the legal framework
• p to A-level.

• Campaigning work: Voter Registration campaigns - working with NGOs such as the Electoral Commission, government agencies and democracy campaign groups.
• Charity/campaign group strategic media communications including how to work with the media, researching and producing press releases, letter writing and newsletter editorial.
• Training and in-depth tuition for UK citizenship tests for migrants.
• Election law training for political party election agents and candidates.
• Commercial private one-to-one or group tuition in GCSE/As/A2 Sociology, Government and politics (British & American), modern British & European History and Citizenship studies.