Long Road students spend the day networking with Trust partners at Colchester

We were hosted by the Politics and History team and the day consisted of a morning workshop in which the students worked alongside their counterparts from Colchester on a pressure group activity related to the oil industry, arguing for and against further drilling in the North Sea. Following this activity, the students had the chance to explore both the college and the town whilst the teachers indulged in charity penalty shoot-outs against Colchester staff and the Vice Principal.

In the afternoon, the students attended a talk by financial lobbyist and former Colchester student Harrison Burns as he answered questions about his career both prior to and during his time as a lobbyist in parliament. Harrison was able to discuss a varied number of policy areas that he is involved with as they have an impact on the financial sector. He was also able to speak of how being a former politics student is valuable to his current role. Following Harrison was another former Colchester student, the Liberal Democrat MP for Carshalton and Wallington, Bobby Dean. Bobby spoke briefly about his life and previous work and then opened up to questions from students and staff in the room regarding his role in the House of Commons as a backbench MP and whip for the Liberal Democrats. He was able to discuss a variety of issues, including the war in Ukraine, his opposition to the government’s current welfare changes and his support for the recent assisted dying bill in its progress through Parliament. Both speakers were very open to discussing their work and were a credit to their professions.

This day was a great chance for students to engage with their counterparts at our new Trust partner college and to hear from two professionals who owe some of their current roles to their A Levels in politics. Many thanks go to Ian over at Colchester for inviting us down for the day and thanks to Harrison and Bobby for engaging with us.

The students involved were Emma Johnson, Samantha Kapesa, Ben Louch, Adriano Muzzin, Amber Kemp, Emmeline Vanier, Conor Runswick, Chloe Crick, Lexi Moore and Liza Petrychenko.

Long Road won the penalty shoot-out 4-2.