For the second year running, SIS attended the Community Celebration event at Brighton MET College. This event marks the end of the academic year for its ESOL learners and is an opportunity for the college to mark the students’ achievements and successes. It has a very vibrant, positive atmosphere which is a real testament to the welcoming nature of the ESOL department at the college. There were art activities, music, food and some awards presented by the teachers to recognise some of the individuals’ commitment to learning.
The event also celebrated the college’s recent award as a College of Sanctuary, an achievement they are justifiably proud of. There has been substantial growth within the ESOL department over recent years, and the college now supports over 250 learners from a Refugee and Asylum Seeker background.
We were invited alongside some other local community support groups to come and speak to students about our services. For some of the students, whilst they are still learning and improving their English, it is still really valuable for them to be able to access interpreting support so that they can fully benefit from healthcare and other appointments. We took along our translated self-referral cards which we have in many languages and are available to order here.
We also have Service User pages in 23 languages through which people can request an interpreter or let us know if they need help with something else.
In addition to this, we were able to promote our Volunteer Social Prescriber role to some of the students in the higher level ESOL classes. This role is a great opportunity to gain some experience working bilingually and can be helpful for anyone with aspirations of becoming a professional interpreter in the future.
Thank you again to the ESOL team at Brighton MET for inviting us to this fantastic Community Celebration!
