Darren Barrenger, community activist and former parliamentary candidate

I have been Chair of Creative Partnerships Tendring since its creation at the beginning of 2006. We are investing a total of £3.2m into creativity projects involving more than 17 schools in Harwich and Clacton.

Creative Partnerships, Tendring, is here to make a difference. It will inspire young people, the teaching profession, the arts community to work together innovatively to raise aspirations, nurture imagination and develop thinking skills. Together our aim is to grow creative citizens who will have a voice and a place in Tendring, and who will develop the life skills necessary to be valuable contributors to their communities. Education is a young persons gateway to their future; through promoting creative learning, we will enable young people to take the opportunities and face the challenges of the world they are growing into.

Our aims at Creative Partnerships Tendring are to:

• Increase the levels of achievement, skills and self confidence of young people
• Support school staff in developing their own creativity, feeding into motivational practices
• Support artists and arts organisations to play an active role in creating learning
• Develop existing and establish new partnerships between schools and the creative, business, community, and statutory sectors
• Help to develop and support an arts infrastructure within Tendring which will actively engage young people, encourage artists to live and work here and support educators to continue the ethos of Creative learning
• Build on current good practice across Creative Partnerships nationally to give Tendring a voice in the regional, national and international debate about creative learning.

For more information about Creative Partnerships see the national programme's website http://www.creative-partnerships.com/ or for information on our projects in Tendring contact our Creative Partnership Director, Anita Belli tendringcp@creative-partnerships.com