Can Education play its part in boosting our local BAME Economy?
In a conversation with a community partner, we discussed how we could better utilise our larger and medium sized BAME owned enterprises by bringing them together to form a consortium. We discussed how this consortium could then bid for Skills Funding Agency (SFA) contracts. From next year, subcontractors will not be allowed to deliver the contracts, so delivery will be the sole responsibility of the primary contractor.
If our consortium were able to win these multi million pound SFA contracts, as primary contractors, they would be able to provide apprenticeship schemes for local people, provide local training and build capacity within their enterprises. This would also offer an opportunity to approach MMU to develop industry specific degrees for their apprenticeships.
Further on down the line, this would also offer opportunities for the consortium to sponsor its own Free School so that it could further concentrate on building its enterprises by nurturing the specific human capital needed for the growth and development of its local enterprises.
We are now currently in talks with our local enterprises to float this idea!
Back to Project Mali, Manchester Project Page, here.