Lambeth Council have announced the opening of a £4 million science, engineering, technology, and mathematics centre in Brixton. This project is part of the ‘Regenerating Brixton Rec Quarter’ and is said to add and improve Brixton Recreation Centre, International House, Brixton Station Road and Beehive Place.
Lambeth Council have begun the process of finding the right operator for the new projects. Lambeth hopes to see the workspace support ‘science and tech’ enterprises, which also make ‘links to the council’s strategy to support creative and cultural growth’ within Brixton.
STEM Centres and enterprises offer education and learning through workshops as well as visiting school. They offer support from children as young as 5 years old to young adults at 24 years old.
They claim their main long-term goal is to support and boost careers in areas of science, maths, technology, and engineering; especially for the youth and young people.
Jenny Haines, a 42 year old mother of two boys aged 11 and 15, said “I am extremely excited about the education centre opening in the area”, she continued to say “I’ve seen how Brixton has been affected by clubs closing down and lack of funding….I hope it will encourage more of the youth into pursuing careers and give them a better chance of getting into university”.
Lambeth council have secured a £2 million fund from the Mayor of London’s ‘Good Growth Fund’, which will transform an unused storage facility into an area for STEM related centres and services to rent this space and offer their services.
The rest of the funding is from the council’s own budget, and the four-borough South London Innovation Corridor programme (a project to drive economic growth in South-London). The transformed storage unit is said to also provide shop fronts for small businesses and is said to create jobs for approximately 850 local people.
Byron Harris, a 22-year-old politics student at City, University of London, stated, “I think that’s great. With all the youth centres being closed down in the last few years, having this open will give the community something it is in drastic need of. University is expensive and some families can’t afford to send their kids, even with student’s loans. Having this open will give the youth and young adults another chance at further education that isn’t university or poorly paid internships”
The centre, that will be opening in March 2022, aims to offer affordable workspaces for local help teams and centres, as well as offer support and education to black and minority ethnic (BAME) people in STEM careers. The council also see this as an opportunity to increase community cohesion and the well-being of the area.
