A NEW partnership has been formed between Bracknell and Wokingham College and Activate Learning.

Plans have been in place since the beginning of January and a series of steps have been taken to provide a seamless transition.

Staff are hugely excited about the possibilities this merger will provide to students in the future.

Sally Dicketts, chief executive of Activate Learning, said: “Bracknell and Wokingham College is a good provider of education with strong ties to the local community.

"But when further education has seen no increase in funding for eight years, and how and where we learn is changing fundamentally with technology, the importance of scale and partnerships becomes essential and our new group of colleges will provide this.

“We are passionate about ensuring our students are getting an education that is both meaningful to them and the local communities they live in.

"This is why we’ve developed relationships with an extensive range of businesses at Activate Learning, working closely with them to ensure what we teach is what they need.

“Our philosophy is to transform lives through learning and one of the things this new partnership will bring is access to our education pathways that can lead to a range of opportunities for our students.

"It opens up to the students of Bracknell and Wokingham the opportunities to learn in a different way through our Learning Philosophy and Learning Attributes."

The merger will bring new choices for not only students at the college, but also staff, giving access to growth and development opportunities

Significant work was undertaken by both colleges to ensure the merger had minimal impact on students and staff.

Paul Newman, head of campus at Bracknell and Wokingham College, has been leading the merger and praised staff at the college for their hard work over the last year.

He added: “There has been such fantastic spirit of collaboration between the two organisations to get to this point as everyone has recognised the benefits of this merger.

“I would like to thank everyone from both organisations that have been involved in this work and for making this process go as smoothly as possible and minimising the disruption to our learners.”