Business backs school improvement charity

Nov. 4, 2014 - PRLog -- Catch Up®, a registered charity that trains Teachers and Teaching Assistants to significantly improve the core literacy and numeracy skills of struggling learners, has won the support of the Social Business Trust (SBT), with an initial investment of professional and financial support worth £320,000. This represents the latest investment for SBT, bringing its portfolio to twelve social enterprises.

SBT saw the potential in helping Catch Up® with its next phase of growth based upon its results to date – it has trained over 21,000 Teaching Assistants and supervisors in over 4,000 establishments in England and Wales to support struggling learnings with their core literacy and numeracy skills. There is a significant body of external research demonstrating that the Catch Up® interventions more than double the rate of progress of struggling learners. SBT wants to help this ambitious social enterprise to expand and deepen its impact. Initial work will look at supporting Catch Up® to continue to expand into new schools and to achieve their aim of reaching 40 per cent of schools in England and Wales.

In parallel, SBT will support an ongoing project to identify how Catch Up® can develop the continuing support it provides to organisations which have already implemented their interventions.

The unique approach of Catch Up® interventions was derived from academic research and developed into a ‘train the trainer’ methodology. Teaching Assistants are trained and equipped with the professional skills to deliver one-to-one interventions; in the form of two fifteen minute sessions per week. Supervising Teachers are trained to manage the Teaching Assistants effectively and to identify the struggling learners that will get the most from Catch Up®.

Teaching Assistants trained by Catch Up® also benefit from an accredited professional qualification.

Julie Lawes, Director of Catch Up®, said “This support is a huge vote of confidence in our potential to enhance the learning of many more struggling students, and help TAs and Teachers to achieve great progress in schools. What we look forward to benefitting from is the enhanced business acumen that SBT and its partners can offer us, so that we can achieve our potential and expand the use of Catch Up® into even more schools across the country.”

CEO of SBT, Adele Blakebrough MBE, said, “The best ideas often seem simple and obvious when you come across them. Catch Up® is a prime example. They are unlocking the potential in Teaching Assistants to help improve literacy and numeracy for pupils who are struggling. With their proven model, which more than doubles the progress of struggling learners, and dedicated leadership team, we're excited to be backing them to make the Catch Up® interventions far more available.”

SBT provides support to its investees in partnership with seven major businesses – Bain and Company, British Gas, Clifford Chance, Credit Suisse, EY, Permira, and Thomson Reuters.

Ends.

Notes to Editors:

Social Business Trust was formed in December 2010. Since then, it has invested in twelve social enterprises. The aims of the Trust include positively affecting the lives of one million people in the UK.

Adele Blakebrough, chief executive, outlined the Trust’s mission on inception as: “We at the Trust will look at a social enterprise and assess the obstacles to growth it faces and establish the best possible support from our partners. We will then manage the investment and relationship between the social enterprise we are supporting and our corporate partner organisations.

We believe that there has never been a more important time for social enterprises to exist and to thrive. But they will only do so if they have a robust business model and a desire to grow. By working with us, we can help them achieve their ambitions and, thereby, help many more of the UK’s most disadvantaged people.”

The Social Business Trust investment portfolio is comprised of twelve of the UK’s most exciting social enterprises:

Bikeworks (http://www.bikeworks.org.uk/)

Catch Up (http://www.catchup.org/)®

Challenge Partners (http://www.challengepartners.org/)

Fashion Enter (http://www.fashion-enter.com/)

Inspiring Futures (http://www.inspiringfutures.org.uk/) Foundation

London Early Years Foundation (http://www.leyf.org.uk/)

Moneyline (http://elmline.co.uk/)

The Challenge (http://www.the-challenge.org/)

The Reader Organisation (http://www.thereader.org.uk/)

Timewise (http://timewisefoundation.org.uk/)

Shakespeare Schools Festival (http://www.ssf.uk.com/)

Young Advisors (http://www.youngadvisors.org.uk/)

What is a social enterprise?

In the UK, the accepted Government-backed definition of social enterprise used by the UK social enterprise sector bodies comes from the 2002 Department of Trade and Industry report 'Social Enterprise: a strategy for success' as:

‘A business with primarily social objectives whose surpluses are principally reinvested for that purpose.’

A suitable and more thorough exploration of social enterprise is listed on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_enterprise), where the UK section includes the above definition and further examples of social enterprises.

About Catch Up®

Catch Up® (the working name of the Caxton Trust) is a not-for-profit charity limited by guarantee (03476510) and a registered charity (1072425). Established in 1997, its mission is: to address literacy and numeracy difficulties that contribute to underachievement

Catch Up® is based in Thetford, Norfolk, and works the UK. It comprises a core office team (including the Director, Julie Lawes) and a team of local authority or self-employed Catch Up® Accredited Trainers. It also works with specialist consultants in education, research, IT, communications, book distribution and multi-media. Catch Up® is governed by a board of trustees.

‘Catch Up® is a registered trademark.