Young people from Just 42 with their Prirogue Canoe, Built in the Longshed
Ever since Woodbridge Riverside Trust (WRT) became leaseholders of The Longshed in 2018 and developed the building from an empty shell into a community facility embracing boat building, skills development, education, exhibitions and community events, we have been keen to ensure that all ages are catered for.
For the younger generations, and working for the first three years with the Sutton Hoo Ship’s Company, we introduced a schools’ education programme called “Follow the Ship”. Originally the idea of Annie Leech and initiated by Sam Simpson (two former trustees of WRT), to date over 1000 local primary school children have participated in the programme, and for at least one local school, visiting The Longshed is now an integral part of their curriculum. We have a great team of volunteers, including several retired teachers, helping to ensure children have a wonderful experience while they are with us.
Also in the early days of The Longshed’s development, WRT worked on several pilot projects with young people under the umbrella of another local charity, Just 42. The results of these pilot projects were quite amazing, not only in terms of what the young people produced but in the huge improvements that resulted in their self-confidence, social skills and well-being. Indeed, the very first boat launched at Whisstocks slipway and built in The Longshed was a canoe built by young people working with Just 42 and Woodbridge Riverside Trust.
We are limited in the amount of space we can use at the present time, as, understandably, the magnificent project by the Sutton Hoo Ship’s Company to build a replica of the Sutton Hoo Burial Ship takes up the majority of the ground floor workshop in The Longshed. But that isn’t stopping us from developing more initiatives which can utilise the space that we do have (until the Ship is launched and more space becomes available).
Last year, and with the tremendous encouragement of the late Cllr Kay Yule and East Suffolk Council who supported us with a grant from the Enabling Communities budget, we had a series of workshops (led by local artist Claudia Myatt) exploring Anglo-Saxon art and design.
We also had a highly successful facilitated workshop in early August last year attended by some young people from local senior schools as well as some local teachers, together with a number of people involved with youth engagement, boat building and local heritage. What was inspiring was the sheer range and clarity of the ideas people put forward. The output from this workshop, together with the experience we have built up over the past few years, has given us the conviction and commitment to take these ideas forward into our longer-term vision and business plan. We have picked up on a couple of the ideas that don’t need a lot of ground floor workshop space, and we have begun! We now have two pilot projects underway.
One involves 8 local organisations (i.e. some local primary and secondary schools and a local youth group) in producing panels/portholes of art depicting the heritage and ecology of the River Deben. We have provided and delivered the materials, and should get the finished artwork in time to have them in place for an ‘opening’ at Eastertime.
For this particular project, we are very grateful for the support of a grant for materials from County Cllr Ruth Leach and Suffolk County Council’s Locality budget.
The other initiative involves a pilot with a local primary school for Year 6 children to build working model boats out of every day rubbish, once their SATs are completed. We are currently bidding for funds to support a programme of skills building to underpin this project.
We hope you will follow the progress of these schemes (and others as they are introduced) and help us to encourage and support our young people.
Whatever we do, we will be striving to make our programmes as inclusive and adaptable as possible.
We also have some ideas for pre-school children when space becomes available – more of that later!
WRT January 2025
