Stephen Perse Foundation and Cambs Youth Panel Tackle Digital Inequality

The Cambs Youth Panel works with local councils as well as members of parliament. They give advice and guidance on all matters that affect young people to the key individuals who make the important decisions in our region. The Cambs Youth Panel looks for issues that need to be addressed and then does something about those issues. Recently this has meant getting computers to children and young people in repeated lockdowns.

Cambs Youth Panel believes that every child and young person needs a computer - digital inequality is a fair reflection of an unequal society that has been failing many children and young people for a long time. With Covid-19 digital inequality came to the forefront.

Stephen Perse has ambitious plans for the future, building on its existing track record of sharing its expertise and resources with the community, to make a step change in its impact in tackling inequality in Cambridge, the wider East Anglian region and more broadly. Stephen Perse is underpinned by a strong belief that everyone has potential, but that some have neither the opportunities or the guidance, the life chances, to develop and maximise that potential.

On Friday 28 January the SPF donated iPads were delivered to the following primary schools:

• Highlees Primary School, Aston Road, Peterborough
• Paston Ridings Primary School, Paston, Peterborough
• The Beeches Primary School, Beech Avenue, Peterborough
• Winyates Primary School, Orton Goldhay, Peterborough
• Middleton Primary School, South Bretton, Peterborough

The iPads were delivered by PCSOs from the South Cambridgeshire Neighbourhood Policing Team Chris Wiseman and Lindsey Gardiner, with thanks to the support from Chief Inspector Paul Rogerson. The schools receiving the devices were thoroughly delighted.

Phil, who founded the Cambs Youth Panel in 2016 said: “The Stephen Perse Foundation are a brilliant partner to work with and they make a clear contribution to communities and families from all walks of life, personal circumstances and backgrounds. It has been wonderful to assist the Stephen Perse Charitable Foundation in distributing these iPads and we are looking forward to doing more with the team in the near future. We’re grateful to Cambridgeshire Constabulary who helped us with the logistics of getting these devices to the recipient schools in Peterborough.”

Heidi Hall, Charitable Foundation Director said “We are thrilled to strengthen our partnership with Phil and the team at Cambs Youth Panel. The global pandemic has only highlighted the inequalities within our community and we are committed to do all we can to make a difference. We have ambitious plans for the future, informed by a contemporary reinterpretation of our Founder’s original vision. We are determined to make an impact and open our doors widely for young people in our community. Working together we believe we can achieve extraordinary things. Thank you to Phil, the Cambs Youth Panel and the Cambridgeshire Constabulary who made sure the iPads were delivered to the schools that needed them most.”