Local learning provider Creative Alliance has made it on to the Royal Bank of Scotland’s Skills and Opportunities funding shortlist. Creative Alliance’s proposed project would see it collaborate with two prominent Birmingham-based businesses, Proband and Bareface, to develop the digital skills of 30 young people from the city’s most disadvantaged areas.

Unemployed Wolverhampton residents are being offered the opportunity to take part in a Better Health for Better Jobs – Working Well Programme. The 12-week programme, which will take place two days per week, is aimed at unemployed people where health and wellbeing is a factor in preventing them from gaining employment.

Themed events organised by HND Hospitality Management students at Walsall College, which have given students their first taste of running events, come with a promise of great food and entertainment. The broad themes include a vintage afternoon tea party (20^th April), Spanish night with tapas (27^th April) and Star Wars themed evening (4^th May) with an international buffet.

As a nation, the Brits have become increasingly fascinated with healthy eating and the food trends of the last few years are evidence of that. The avocado craze is still going strong, healthy cookbooks from Deliciously Ella, Hemsley + Hemsley and Anna Jones are flying off the shelves; and we seem to be more attuned to the effect that our diets have on our health and happiness than ever before.

A new report by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers is calling for a major rethink about the role of schools and colleges in promoting engineering. The ‘Big Ideas: the future of engineering in schools’ report, supported by the Royal Academy of Engineering, reflects the views of leading engineering education experts and key stakeholders such as employers, parents and pupils.

Secondary school students from across Birmingham and the surrounding region have been invited to don their chef whites and put their culinary skills to the test for Busy Bees Training Academy’s ‘Greens to Gourmet’ Cookery Challenge 2016. Building on the success of last year’s inaugural competition, which was won by 14 year-old Tre Whitelock from Wheelers Lane Technology College in Kings Heath, Busy Bees Training Academy will be encouraging Year 9 and Year 10 students from across Birmingham and the West Midlands to pursue their passion for cooking.