FCA office move to Stratford signals support for local students

In recent years the borough of Newham has worked hard to move from being the second most deprived borough in the UK in 2010 to the 25th in 2015.

However, despite this improvement, 38% of children in the borough are still living in households below the poverty line and 19% of residents do not earn the national minimum wage. So, when the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) moved its head office from the financial heart of Canary Wharf to the International Quarter in Stratford, Newham, we knew it would be an opportunity to work with the company to help it carry on its work supporting the community, in a new area. The FCA wanted to create a social leadership programme that would both inspire its employees and allow them to apply their skills and knowledge to support the Newham community in its quest to become a more successful and resilient borough. We were thrilled to be asked to work with it on this with the FCA team, alongside our friends at Good Business.

Working in partnership with Good Business, we created a programme aiming to plug the gap in provision of support for children moving from primary to secondary school, a critical transition time that impacts the aspirations and motivations of young people (a serious issue given the number of children living below the poverty line in Newham).

The new programme ‘Inspiring Futures’, launched at the end of September by the FCA’s CEO Andrew Bailey, will help raise the aspirations for 11-13 years olds as they transition from primary school. By delivering school-based activities and events at the FCA on topics such as mindset and teamwork, the programme will tap into the huge diversity and range of experience within the FCA team and leverage the assets they have to help the young people of Newham believe in what they can do.

To mark the opening of the offices, which sees around 4,000 staff moving from Canary Wharf to the 15-storey building in the International Quarter in Stratford, near the Olympic Park, and to highlight the FCA’s commitment to supporting the local community, it invited more than 100 Year 7 pupils from Sarah Bonnell all-girls school in Stratford and Rokeby, an all-boys school in Canning Town, for the opening ceremony, at which the FCA also launched its Inspiring Futures careers guidance programme for youngsters in the borough. Read more about this event here.

We look forward to bringing you more news about this programme as it progresses.