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Human Learning Systems (HLS) and the Preston Co-operative Education Centre - Educating about life with life, some common links.
This blog has been co-authored by Lowis Charfe (Course Leader for the MA in Social Pedagogy Leadership) and Julian Manley (Social Innovation Manager) from the University of Central Lancashire.
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If you have been keeping an eye on the news over the last couple of years you may have heard or seen the media reporting on the ‘Preston Model’ for local economic development. I have been lucky enough to attend a few meetings and discussions with my colleague Julian Manley and others, about the Preston Model and Preston Co-operatives.
One of these co-operatives is the innovative Preston Co-operative Education Centre, dedicated to a fresh approach to education and life, and the first union-co-operative in the UK, where union members have an equal role in governance, along with management. Because Julian has been instrumental in setting this up, I invited him to the launch of the new HLS e-book and report as I thought he would find it interesting. As expected, Julian made the links immediately and hence we agreed to write this blog setting out where we see the synergies between HLS, the Preston Model and social pedagogy.
So, what is the Preston Model? In very simple terms it is about supporting local areas to develop community wealth and keep money and investment within that local area. In doing so, it encourages the development of co-operatives and co-operative principles underpinned by shared values, enhancing democracy and engagement. This relies on collaboration and relationship building between the community and what they call ‘anchor institutions’- institutions that have deep roots within the local community.
The University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), where we both work, is an ‘anchor institution’ due to the impact and influence it has in the local area. It provides jobs, invests capital, purchases goods and services and has students that will live and spend money in the local area. These students will also become part of the local community via part-time jobs and social activities they get involved with. These anchor institutions play an important part in supporting community wealth building and here we can see the first link to HLS.
And what is the Preston Co-operative Education Centre (PCEC)? It’s a teaching and learning space for all that works to ethical co-operative values and principles and in the spirit of democracy. All students are teachers and all teachers are students and the centre is governed by its members, including the students. In the PCEC learning through experience is as valuable as more traditional approaches. It’s understood that learning can lead to real change, with students becoming agents of their own lives, and creators of work projects that are meaningful to them and communities.
The ultimate aim of the PCEC is to provide education that works for all, governed by co-operative principles, leading to transferable skills in participatory democracy and ultimately future worker-owned and co-operative businesses. The PCEC aims to provide a learning environment where people are supported to consider starting up their own co-operative business. It will provide a range of education and training, from practical skills-based training to university level education. Here we see a link to HLS with regards to ‘learning as a management strategy’.
As Toby Lowe, points out and with real links to social pedagogy, creating a learning environment where people can explore, test and experiment whilst understanding the systems they are working in, is vital to developing co-operative cultures and businesses. It’s also important in being able to manage and navigate the complexities of local communities, their needs and identity, whilst supporting workers cooperatives to develop in response to these local needs. So here there are clear links to all three aspects of the HLS.
As Toby says in the new e-book and report, the ‘Human’ element of HLS starts with the moral purpose of all public sector organisations, which is to support human flourishing. For many anchor institutions this translates as ‘social value’. From a social pedagogical point of view this shared moral purpose allows relationships to be fostered and increases cooperation between communities and institutions, so there is a sense of meaningful belonging for all involved. This links to the ‘Systems’ element of HLS and as Dawn Pilmmer states in her chapter ‘nurturing collaborative systems approach’ matters a lot. The Preston Model fits with the definition of a ‘place-based’ system, as explained by Dawn, as it also fits into a wider public remit. For example, UCLan as part of this, is not only a ‘place-based’ organisation within Preston but also is part of the national HEI system within England.
When thinking about systems, place matters and is an important starting point to consider. As we have explained, the Preston Model, and its educational pillar, the PCEC, was born out of a desire but also a need to help the local communities and the economy in the Preston area. But it is also about responding to the needs of local Preston people by understanding these specific ‘place-based’ needs and their local identity.
In line with the HLS approach, Preston City Council developed policies that focused on a ‘community benefiting purpose’ that aided and supported resources and money to remain in the local area. These policies are there to help assist organisations to work collaboratively instead of making them compete against each other for a share of any funding. This involved developing new procurement rules alongside investment from ‘anchor’ institutions. As an example of this, UCLan and other anchor institutions now buy more goods and services locally than ever before, and where this hasn’t been possible then the Preston Model encourages the development of worker-owned cooperatives to try and fill in these gaps. Again, with the focus of supporting human flourishing and community wealth building.
An important point here is that learning, when viewed from a HLS and social pedagogical standpoint, is not about the management or control of staff. Rather learning is seen as fundamental to every aspect of helping make an organisation, business or staff team flourish by developing skills and knowledge around autonomy, trust and appreciative inquiry. Again looking back at Toby’s chapter on learning as a management strategy, he highlights the important point of co-design (which links to the co-operative principles and the way the PCEC is governed) and the importance of this being used to not design organisational systems or programmes, but an environment where there is a shared purpose and space to experiment and reflect on the learning.
In line with HLS and social pedagogical thinking, the PCEC takes a broad view of education and cooperation, coming at it from a holistic learning point of view and acknowledges that this learning occurs in the ‘everyday’. This facilitates students to be able to develop and take away ideas about working in line with co-operative principles and values, even if they are not ready or don't want to start up a co-operative business. There is an overall cultural and social element to all teaching, a real focus on the ‘human’ as well as attention to co-operative businesses and values.
This is not just about supporting businesses to flourish in an economic sense. It’s also about the human beings who are at the heart of these, who will be able to create more healthy, human systems. With its links to the Co-operative College in Manchester and the University in Mondragon (https://www.co-op.ac.uk/; https://www.mondragon.edu/en/home ) the Centre will provide equitable and exciting education for all, regardless of disadvantage, disability or any other social factor that leads to marginalization. PCEC is committed to and working towards creating a learning environment that will cater for the educational needs of the diverse range of people living in Preston.
The Education Centre as framed in the Preston Model is an example of how we can support people to embed the core elements of the Human Learning System into practice. Returning to the important point about supporting the development of ‘place-based’ systems, we need to consider what ‘conditions’ are needed to help these.
We believe that the PCEC will help people learn the fundamentals needed and skills required to transform and develop worker owned cooperatives. A basis in shared co-operative values and principles which are aligned to HLS is the starting point for the seeds of growth.
This is followed by supporting people to gain the skills needed to develop and manage the complexities of working relationships based on trust; exploring what is meant by ‘collaborative behaviors’ and how we can develop active participation and co-production within the systems with anchor organisations; an awareness of power and the role this plays within local areas and organisations. And importantly looking at how we develop structures and systems that support worker owned cooperatives to function, using existing examples of these that already exist. As well as the importance of system stewards and the need to embed emergent learning in all areas.
So to sum up, HLS starts with recognising that life is complex and there is no one, simple answer to fixing many of the social problems we see, whilst supporting communities to flourish. To use a social pedagogical term, ‘it depends’ and as Dawn Pilmmer writes, ‘the work of developing healthy systems is never done’. However we believe that this should not put us off from being brave enough to step forward and try different approaches.
With a shared moral purpose and value base as well as a willingness to learn together along the way, a social pedagogical approach, the use of HLS and co-operative education can help us navigate these complexities and build businesses that are truly ‘anchor institutions’ that provide ‘social value’ for all! The future indeed could look quite bright…
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This blog has been co-authored by Lowis Charfe (Course Leader for the MA in Social Pedagogy Leadership) and Julian Manley (Social Innovation Manager) from the University of Central Lancashire.
Format: Blogs
Tags: Case Studies , Change , Public Services , Systems Transformation , Growth , Learning
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