There were many presentations and awards handed out on the day. It was a fun packed day with lots of quizzes with a happy resident winning her prize of strawberries, – and of course a lot of eating!

Other young people from other housing providers and also members of Bradford Council attended the event.

You will be able to see photos from the day on our new Facebook group.

All participants were later invited to a tour of Hallmark premises to see how things were done. During the tour they were shown every facet of the Hallmark operation from designing a product to manufacturing and distributing.  With a few free samples along the way!

The project received some great feedback from the residents and learners. “I enjoyed doing a practice interview and got some great advice,” said one resident. A survey showed that every participant felt more confident and motivated after the training.

The project was a real success and Bradford Foyer are now in process of assigning job coaches to assist the young people in their job hunting.

The day included a tour of Doncaster Foyer, checking out their gym facilities (which most of our residents were jealous of), communal areas and the resident’s quarters. The day also included a questions and answer session followed by a picnic down their local park.

Both Foyers are now keen on keeping an ongoing relationship with Richard from Learning & Developments seeing how they deliver on new learning programmes. With also Chris from Housing interested in having friendly football matches with Doncaster Foyer, having set up their own football team recently.

Doncaster Foyer are hoping to come visit Bradford Foyer and we will welcome them as much as Yvonne (Manager) and the residents from Doncaster welcomed us.

Bradford Villa played exceptionally well and were (by far!) the best team, winning 3 matches and drawing one game. A special mention to Luke Smith and Kyle Wood who both performed admirably. The success of the team will hopefully stand us in good stead for various tournaments and football opportunities in the coming months.

Bradford Kickback was set up 18 months ago and is the first of what is planned to be an ongoing football league. The aim of the project is to be a weekly free event, for young men living in hostels and other supported accommodation, to come together and play together, whilst also improving their health. A range of clients come from all over Bradford every Friday to play the beautiful game.

Opportunities have arisen for one young person at the event to be a potential candidate to play for his country in the 2011 Homeless World Cup in France. We’re hoping that our 6 young men will be added to that short list! They will be attending the event every week. We wish them all the luck!

The project involved bringing in a mentor to work with a group of young people to produce 2 films to be broadcast on Sky’s Community Channel. Angela Davison was the chosen mentor for the young people. She is a Producer/Director who has worked on programmes for BBC and ITV including Top Gear and Bizarre ER.

Five young students from the Foundation Learning course took part in the project. The students came up with 2 film ideas. The first film raises awareness of Women’s Rugby; the second film shows the effects of EMA cuts for young people. Both films are very topical at the moment in the news and are shot in a documentary style. Each film was given a £500 budget to make a 4 and a half-minute broadcast-quality short film.

All participants were very dedicated to the project and had to come in to work unsociable hours including a weekend. The young people went on location, dealt with professional clients and members of the public. They were given individual roles such as Director, Camera, Sound, Project Manager, Editor and also 2 of our young people were the main focus in both films. The project was very youth-led and they got a real insight into working as a real film crew. It was a very intense 4 weeks of planning and filming.

Doing this project has shown the progression for Foyer Media and the Learning and Development team. To be able to have 2 broadcast quality documentaries to be shown on Sky’s Community Channel is a massive achievement for Bradford Foyer and especially for the young people.

The short films will be shown on The Community Channel between 22nd March- 26th March 2011.The channel is broadcast on Virgin 233, 24/7 on Sky 539 and on Freeview 87 from 5am-8am. The 2 films will be uploaded on the our Media page, youtube channel and Facebook group very soon!!!

A huge credit to the 5 young people who were involved in the project. Wasim Khalid, Rizvan Akhtar, Zoheb Hameed, Paris Williams and Natasha Hinchcliffe.

Last year the Foyer was approached by Fabric for any young people to take part in a 2 week filmmaking course. The Media team sent Natasha Hinchcliffe who is a resident here and also a student on the Foundation Learning to take part in the Project.

Fabric ran 2 week courses in November and December 2010 in partnership with Bradford City of Film and InspirED who delivered the course. The course gave 30 young people the chance to make a short documentary film about issues affecting them. Topics chosen by the young people to explore in their documentaries were School, Unemployment, Attitudes to the Police and Drugs and Alcohol.

Natasha was heavily involved throughout the project. She took the lead on coming up with ideas and script development, research, camera, sound, and interviewing. She edited the final film by herself with support from staff.

“Tasha was the star of the group” said Abbe Robinson, who ran the project.

The finished films made entirely by the young people will be screened in the community and also at Bradford International Film Festival in March 2011. Fabric and City of Film are hoping to run another filmmaking course in the summer.

For the past few weeks our Foundation learners have been making a new video based on the concept of MTV Cribs: A popular programme that shows off a celebrity’s home.

The aim of film is to show other young people what the Foyer, and a typical flat or cluster looks like. This allows any young person to have an insight to the Foyer environment if they wished to come to Foyer as a resident.

Natasha Hinchcliffe, who is also a resident at Bradford Foyer, was the star of the film. She made a fantastic presenter, a role that she would have never have considered doing before joining Foyer Media. The Learning and Development department have seen her confidence grow immeasurably since she started the course.

The film shows the reception, the accommodation (living room and bedroom) car park and also the Media Centre.

Credits go to Natasha Hinchcliffe, Stephanie Fenton, David Blackburn, Rizwan Akhtar, Zoheb Hameed and Waz Khalid in making the film.

You can watch the Foyer Cribs film in the Media Section of our website and also on our YouTube channel.
Production stills can be seen on the Bradford Foyers Facebook group

Some scenes are created for dramatic effect and for entertainment purposes.

Last year students from Bradford Foyer submitted an entry for the ‘Made in Bradford’ films school competition. Two of the Foyers ex-students along with the media team attended the screening held at the National Media Museum, Bradford.

The National Media Museum held its first ‘Shooting Stars’ event as part of Bradford City of Film on Saturday 9th October 2010, where all entries were screened in their cinema. Three judges watched all the entries, one being Peg Alexander the Director of City of Film.

Our film ‘Idol Eyes’ was a 3 minute short film about trying to change the perceptions and views about young people and how they are perceived by the media and society.

Guest speakers were at the event, talking about how they got into the film industry which was then followed by watching all the films made by the schools. After seeing all the entries the judges announced the top 3 films.

First place went to the Bradford Foyer, ex-students Evie Benton and Shaunie Baldwin went to the front to pick up their prize.

“I can’t believe we won, I didn’t think we would win after they had already announced 2nd and 3rd place, this is amazing” said Evie.

Peg Alexander, the Director of Bradford City of Film said: “It was such a great film, the way it was short, expertly shot and straight to the point. The concept of the film was up to date and had a great twist at the end.”

A huge congratulations to Evie Benton, Shaunie Baldwin. And also a pat on the back to Joseph Braithwite, Matthew Dutton and Connor Hirst who unfortunately were unable to make the screening.

The winning film can be viewed on Bradford Foyers Facebook site or YouTube channel.

Lincoln Anderson and Rozi, well-known animation Editor/Producers came to the Foyer to do a 2-hour animation workshop working with our students. Lincoln has worked on numerous films and children’s TV programmes such as Dennis the Menace, Wind in the Willows, Dangermouse and also Tim Burtons The Corpse Bride.

The 2 hour workshop started with students drawing a row of simple action images that would then be placed in a zoetrope. A zoetrope is a device that produces an illusion of action, from a rapid succession of static pictures when spun.

The session then moved on to stop motion animation. This is a technique of physically manipulating an object and photographing them one frame of film at a time to create an illusion of movement. The group split up in to 2 groups. One group doing claymation (using plasticine) and the other group doing pixelation (using human movement). The Foyer had never seen the group so quiet when they were making their plasticine models!

The workshop gave the students another element of filmmaking, which they hope to use in their future film projects. The session was fun, very informative and very hands on. We hope to do further workshops with Lincoln and Rozi.

You can see the work they produced from the day on the Facebook Group and youTube channel.

6am, on a rainy cloudy summers day, 8 Foyer Media students arrive at the Foyer ready for a 4 hour road trip down to London to see their film get screened at Channel 4 Headquarters.

The students and the Media teams film tackles the subject of ‘coming of age’. A brief was given to us by Media Works. Media Works is an ongoing project that is funded by Virgin Media who have provided more equipment for the Bradford Foyer’s Media Centre.

Media Works is set up by The Foyer Federation, Community Builders and Tomtom Nation, creating an online social network between the Foyers around the UK. The aim of the project is to allow the young people to express their feelings through the use of media such as film, music and writing.

At Channel 4’s own private cinema, our students sat nervously watching their film on a large screen viewed in front of other media professionals including 4Talent.
Bradford Foyer’s young people received an award and certificate presented by the Chief Executive of the Foyer Federation.

The students spent the rest of the day sightseeing around London. Lots of photos were taken throughout the day. It was a fantastic day out and also a celebration of their hard work in making the film.

The video ‘Like Father, Like Son’ can be viewed on our youTube Channel and on our Facebook group.

Photos can also be viewed on the Facebook Group.