Winners announced at Buckinghamshire Adult Learning Awards 2019

The winner of the Buckinghamshire Adult Learner of the Year was announced at our awards ceremony last week, as part of the Festival of Learning. Over 130 people attended the annual Adult Learning Awards which was held at the Waterside Theatre, Aylesbury, including nominated learners, trainees, assessors, tutors, learning support assistants and volunteers as well as staff and Buckinghamshire County Council’s Cabinet Member for Education and Skills Anita Cranmer and Sarah Callaghan, Service Director for Education. Councillor Cranmer presented the certificates to all those nominated and the winners of the following awards: Adult Learner of the Year, Trainee of the Year, Tutor of the Year, Learning Support Assistant of the Year and Volunteer of the Year. We were delighted to extend our celebrations to include learners from our new Traineeship scheme and Supported Internship programme for the first time this year.

Sandra Bacon, who is an English and Family Learning learner was awarded the ‘Adult Learner of the Year 2019’.

Sandra’s tutors, Iva Abbey and Jill Organ, who nominated her for the award, said of her, “Sandra deserves this award for her commitment to Adult Learning and for the effort she has put into improving her education for the sake of her family and her own self-esteem. Sandra supports others in the class, she is friendly, enthusiastic and funny. She works diligently and attends regularly even when her life seems to be in turmoil. She works well with learners from different backgrounds and with varying abilities.

Sandra said of her learning journey, “My Buckinghamshire Adult Learning classes have made me feel more confident, more than ‘just a mum’, and have given me the old Sandra back. Coming to the classes has given me the confidence and belief that I can achieve what I could not manage at school. I also have a new dream that my children won’t see their mum as a failure. I now realise that I am capable of doing anything I want to. My classes have been wonderful and the teachers are fantastic.”

Other winners announced on the night were:

Trainee of the Year – Alicia Stocke
Tutor of the Year – Tim Wright, ESOL Fractional Tutor
Learning Support Assistant of the Year – Gay Hutchings-Hay, ESOL, English and ALDD LSA
Volunteer of the Year – Richard Vincent, ALDD volunteer

To see more photos of the event, visit our Learner Gallery.