DROP IN: Goldsmiths’ Institute

In November we drove up to Birmingham to have a poke about at the Goldsmiths’ Institute.

We’d heard a few things about the work going on in Aston, Birmingham, specifically around Jewellery T Levels and wanted to learn more. Aston University Goldsmiths’ Institute Project Manager Collette Waudby and Benchpeg have a mutual connection with the School of Jewellery and recently reconnected.

We arrived on a grey November morning on Lister Street and were welcomed instantly with a hot cup of tea and entrance to the training facility. We found ourselves presenting / speaking, trying to style it out, to the current cohort of 16 and 17 year olds on the new Jewellery T Level course, to what appeared at first to be a nonplussed audience looking at this strange middle aged woman who rambled at them in a very roundabout manner.

Benchpeg can only talk from a perspective of lived experience, and that is what we talked about – shaping a career in the jewellery industry and allied crafts suitable for you. As we spoke about our, very personal experience we started to get eye contact, we started to get smiles. Mid way through our ramble, the boys were reminded that they needed to go to lunch because they only had a half hour break. We waited for a mass exodus, but no one moved.

We covered neurodiversity, school, studying, creativity, overcoming adversity, following your own instinct to create your own path, we talked about jobs and CVs and most importantly how to play to your own strengths, not your weaknesses.

Afterwards we had the opportunity to meet the young people on the course, see what they were doing, and what they were achieving. The level of work greatly exceeded that which one would assume an A Level would produce. The course has an emphasis on problem solving within a defined brief. As we know, being shown, replicating and practice (or in old speak demonstration, observation, replication, modelling and repetition and refinement) are the ways in which skills training is passed on within the workshop environment. The Goldsmiths’ Institute provides at the project based work within the confines of the T Level syllabus with a research component built in. Here, fantastic sketchbook work was on display and in daily use, where engagement was obvious. We even got shown a finished doodle by the designer who sketched through our talk, with our encouragement - a very well constructed graphic expertly executed in proportion to the scrap piece of paper it was conceived upon.

We had a great, welcoming visit  - thank you so much to the staff and the cohort for being so open and engaging - which left us with an overwhelming sense that jewellery making at T Level could provide a solid foundation to a pathway within industry – a way in which to engage young minds, embrace their inherent creativity and spark a love of making.

After our visit we received a follow up email::

“Dear Rebecca
Thank you so much for coming in. Everyone was buzzing from your visit. I personally left the session feeling lifted; the way you speak is warm, real and completely tangible. It landed beautifully with every one of us.

The students haven’t stopped talking about it. Their feedback has been brilliant:
• “It was way more interesting than those ‘inspirational speakers’ schools send in.”
• “I loved it! It made me feel normal because she was.”
• “I could no way go to lunch!!!! Too invested, man!”
• “Better than Netflix.”

The feedback from the cohort made our week, our month, our year, our decade!

WE AM BETTER THAN NETFLIX ?!!

And we will take that to the grave with a smile on our face!

We would encourage anyone from industry to go along and see the great work which is going on in Aston.

For more information:

https://www.aston.ac.uk/reputation/new-jewellery-skills-training-centre

https://augi.co.uk/