Monday 25 February 2013

Ipswich Travel, Roadworks and all that Stuff sent to improve our Patience!

With thanks to Ipswich Central for sending me the e-mail with the following information for Ipswich residents;

Travel Ipswich Information 
 
With roadworks continuing across the town until 2014 there are a variety of sources which are regularly updated to provide information about what is happening, where and when. We will also use our twitter account @ipscentral to provide interim updates.

Information can be found in the following places:
  • A breakdown of the coming weeks works on the allaboutipswich Travel Ipswich page, updated every Friday.
  • travelipswich.co.uk provides an overview of the project and a breakdown of the areas that will be affected. 
  • roadworks.org allows you to search for Ipswich and view all current roadworks.
​If you have any enquiries about Travel Ipswich please contact Suffolk County Council directly at travelipswich@suffolk.gov.uk.


Tuesday 19 February 2013

Through The Tears - Buy my book for International Womens Day and Oxfam

Last night I went to a presentation by Oxfam in readiness for the launch of International Womens Day 8th March 2013.

We heard how Oxfam transforms lives across the world helping people, especially women and children to make something of their lives - this is an extract from their website


Oxfam is working towards a world where everyone has enough to eat and where women especially have the opportunity to earn a decent living.
Life is tough for millions of poor food producers, but the current economic crisis is hitting them particularly hard. And it's women that are worst affected. Many women work the land or are employed in informal, casual work, so when things go wrong, they're the first to lose their jobs and go without when household budgets shrink.

Lasting solutions to poverty

"Oxfam believes in giving a 'hand up' out of poverty rather than just a 'hand out'. 
...the story of farmer Leyla, her community and how with Oxfam's help they built an irrigations system for their crops and now harvests make enough money to put food on the table, build homes and send their children to school."

We were asked to promote the GET TOGETHER day on 8th March to raise funds so I am going to do 2 things.
1) I am going to promote the Get together day by tweeting, blogging and word of mouth
2) I am going to donate ALL profits from the sale of a book I co-wrote a few years ago, called Through The Tears which is about 2 friends, one that is suffering from domestic violence and one that is grieving over a lost relationship. 
We realised we were not going to make money out of the project but it was something we wanted to do as friends. It was fun, therapeutic and we did sell a few dozen!
It's been sitting gathering dust on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and so I have decided to resurrect it for the purpose of raising funds.
Anything made from now until 11th March 2013 will be sent to Oxfam. After that I will pick another worthy charity probably NSPCC

So 2 websites for you to look at. the first is the Oxfam site

http://www.oxfam.org.uk/get-together?intcmp=hp_163_hych2_get-together_2013-02-15

and the second is where you can take a look at the book and then buy!


http://www.lulu.com/shop/nadia-cenci-and-stella-lever/through-the-tears/paperback/product-392804.html




Wednesday 13 February 2013

Latest on Thorington Windfarm proposals

Ben and I met up over the weekend to discuss the latest on Thorington wind turbines.

The picture shows us at the top of Bridgewater Road and if you look in the distance just past the telegraph pole, this is where the turbine will be seen, in all its glory.

The proposals have shifted the siting of the turbines a little and residents were able to discuss this with Ben Gummer during one of his regular 'Ben in the Pub' evenings at the Kingfisher last week. I was unable to attend as it was my mums 80th birthday and I had a surprise lined up.

SIT also send out regular newsletters and the following is an extract taken from their most recent.


If you are feeling just the slightest bit bored with the subject of wind turbines, look at the youtube clip of a moment in the final construction phase of the two turbines at Eye airfield!

Imagine that going along the little road to Belstead! 

Eye now has two 130 metre turbines standing, but not yet working. I'm told they are right by the A140, so if you have a chance drive to Eye - you can't miss them.
The developer there is Triodos, the same as at Kessingland.  


I will be consulting with residents again in the very near future but, in the meantime, if any of you want to contact me you can put comments below this post, tweet me on @stokeparkcllr (I'd like you to follow me and vice versa too) or e-mail me at nadia.cenci@councillors.ipswich.gov.uk


Saturday 2 February 2013

Education Standards in Suffolk - It's up to YOU!

I think its about time we all had a very honest debate about schools in our town and county. It is so easy to blame the politicians but I think their role is a very small proportion of what makes a school's success.

Ipswich Spy has written a very good article today about this and I have made a comment to the writer, copied below;

Time for everyone to get together. As I tweeted last week it is down to Heads, Teachers, parents, the pupils themselves as well as SCC. You can lead a horse to water etc.. With rights comes responsibilities.  You have the right to be educated in this country but you need to turn up!  You need engagement of parents and we need more aspiration from the Heads. The best schools have heads who believe all their pupils can do well, are aspiring and instill discipline, who have great head boys and head girls and where parents get involved and there is a great community around it. Cllr Newman is a capable and knowledgeable man with the right attitude to take this forward. Dont blame him! This is so so much wider. Dare I say it Ipswich is not an aspirational town and can be stuck in it's ways. Lets have a shake up and make sure EVERYONE takes the rap for this……

I know Cllr Graham Newman and he is an intelligent, considerate, calm and knowledgeable politician who I admire greatly. Quite frankly its a load of tosh to put the blame solely on his doorstep. Shame on the rest of you, including the media who hate to run feel good stories about our people, instead choosing to highlight the negative, under the misconception that it will always sell more. Time to show our town in it's most glorious.

With my other hat on - my business hat - I work in a lot of schools and i can tell you that they differ greatly from town to town, area to area. So if it's the politician's job for standards to rise, how can there be this disparity?

My own view is that the head makes the biggest difference. They have the influence over the whole school and show their teachers how they would like to see the school run and how the vulnerable pupils can be helped. If they have the strength to stand up to parents and insist on their involvement with their child, it can make all the difference. I also noticed that the best schools have 'Head boys/girls' who are respected by all the pupils, where their influence is one that makes them proud and not seen as teachers pet. Pupils need mentors, 'buddies' and for all staff to be signed up to the same ethos.

There are times when i am truly flabbergasted at the behaviour of some pupils, where I have had the door literally shut on my face when i am carrying boxes of training equipment etc instead of being held open for me. i have heard the most awful swear words being shouted out in the corridors and not one teacher has pulled them up on their behaviour. I might be old fashioned but that would NEVER have been allowed in my day.  Now I don't want to go back to the old days where pupils were seen and not listened to but there has to be a good way that's somewhere in the middle.

Peer pressure in school is a huge factor with a lack of confidence that is quite rife in Ipswich  that means students pretend not to care or work hard in order to seem 'cool'. There are many ways to combat this with good partnership working and some emotional intelligence training. Life skills are more important than the subjects studied in my book. Confidence is key to success for all of us. My nephew left school with hardly any qualifications and is already a top salesman in his industry because he is such a confident young man who believes he can do anything. And he can!

Good parents will always take time to communicate with their children, instill discipline for homework and check their progress with teacher, backing them up when appropriate in a non-defensive way. We have to work with teachers not against them for a healthy relationship. Children respect their parents more when boundaries are made and kept. Its plain common sense. Setting a good example with hard work, focus and determination will encourage the right attitude in their children. It isn't up to politicians and teachers to do all of this work.

I also think good teachers will always plan their work to the highest capability within the class, not the lowest. This is the only way to see who needs help catching up and who is keeping up. Aspiration and confidence can only grow this way and we can't afford to keep everyone down in the name of ease or equality.

And this is my last point. Equality should be about equal opportunity, not equal outcomes. If a pupil works harder than others then they need to have teachers who ensure they are always challenged. Instead of dumbing down exams, we need to raise the capability and we can only do that if every pupil knows what 'best' looks like, even if they do not quite reach it.

Personal goals should always be challenging and I'd like to see more goal setting in schools. All pupils have a gift to offer the world (and want to do well and make their parents proud). We just need to help them find it...