Author Archives: Paul Harrison

Paul Harrison

In praise of Erasmus+

By Paul Harrison | Mon 1st February 2021 - 9:38 am

In January 2020, Boris Johnson told the Commons that;

There is no threat to the Erasmus scheme, and we will continue to participate in it. UK students will continue to be able to enjoy the benefits of exchanges with our European friends and partners, just as they will be able to continue to come to this country.

So, true to form, we are leaving the programme.

This decision has highlighted a lack of understanding of what it involved. Coverage of the programme in the press, and by politicians, from the Prime Minister down, refers only to Universities, which is just one of the strands of Erasmus+ and it is time to highlight the ‘plus’ in Erasmus+ and what we stand to lose.

Erasmus+ covers schools, FE and vocational sectors, adult education, youth and sport. These are all sectors that have suffered significant budget cuts in recent years, and Erasmus+ funding has enabled these sectors to continue to innovate and learn.

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged | 21 Comments
Paul Harrison

What did the EU ever do for us?

By Paul Harrison | Mon 20th June 2016 - 11:38 am

 

And so the Brexit campaign tells us how much better things would be if we went it alone.  Well, let me share my own experience as a former Headteacher and bring some perspective and reality into the argument.

Apparently we constantly lose out financially by being in the EU. Not my experience.

My school was a relatively successful rural comprehensive in County Durham. As with many rural schools, we struggled each year to balance our budgets and were certainly not favoured by either central or local government. No Building Schools for the Future, Excellence in Cities or Action Zones funding for us! We were certainly losing out compared to other schools in the area.

With no capital funding available, I turned to Europe and twice successfully bid for funding, to build a Construction Workshop and a Virtual Learning Environment. These were not large sums – €120,000 and €150,000 – but it was money I could not access elsewhere. We ran four Comenius projects and a Youth in Action project with our European partners, averaging €25,000 per project, so bringing in a further €125,000 to the school. And then we also successfully bid for two European Social Fund projects to share our best practice with teachers elsewhere in the EU and this brought in a further €80,000.

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 28 Comments
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