March 2026
⭐We can work with your organisation to design and deliver programmes tailored to your individual objectives.⭐
One example, is the Westcoast Limited BrightSparks Stellar Award.
Through the programme, Westcoast wanted to:
⭐ Engage with local schools
⭐ Inspire young people to work in the technology sector
⭐ Raise awareness of Westcoast and the type of job opportunities they offer
⭐ Encourage self-motivated young people to design a development plan for their school communities which will benefit all students
We worked in partnership to create a successful programme to help Westcoast achieve their objectives.
The Westcoast Brightsparks Stellar Award is a school wide initiative open to students in Years 10 to 13. The project helps students develop their business understanding and the potential of new technology to enhance their learning environment.
The project covers business planning and presentation skills along with mentoring to help young people to develop skills and experience in business and support the curriculum.
The aim of the launch workshop is for participants to understand Westcoast as a company, its products and for students to begin to generate ideas on how Westcoast can help transform their school space with state-of-the-art equipment.
Shortlisted schools took their idea to the final, hosted at the Westcoast headquarters in Theale, and compete for the Stellar Award prize which is £25,000 of technology to the winning school.
This year’s winning school was Little Heath School. 🙌 Their article shows the value of the programme for the school and its students.
The runners up were Trinity School who won £5,000. 👊
“The students should be immensely proud of themselves — the dedication, discipline, and creativity they’ve shown over the last five months has been nothing short of remarkable. Their presentation and video truly blew me away. It was so clear how hard they’ve worked and how much time they put into preparing…I really hope this experience inspires them in their future endeavours, no matter what path they choose…And thank you to Vicky and the entire EBP team for putting on such a fantastic competition. No matter the outcome, I truly believe every student involved will take away valuable life lessons they can carry with them into the future.” – Jack Dunster, Westcoast Limited
“The Westcoast Stellar Award is one of the most enriching projects I have had the pleasure to work on. I know the judges had an incredibly tough job as all the schools involved were so deserving.” – Victoria Hanford, EBP Education Project Officer
In their feedback, 100% of Little Heath students said ‘yes’ they had been inspired and motivated by the challenge.
If your business would benefit from a similar programme, contact us on:
01635 279277
info@ebp.org.uk
🌟 We are delighted to announce the winner of this year’s Cultivate Grand Final which took place on Wednesday 25th March 🌟
Cultivate is an exciting entrepreneurial challenge which encourages curious, self-motivated young people to develop a business idea and take some important first steps to shape their own business strategy.
This year 710 young people aged between 12-19 years entered our Cultivate challenge which was sponsored by Zebra Technologies.
Our school based workshops introduced the students to the world of Zebra Technologies and business planning. The students then submitted their ideas to a panel of judges and those shortlisted were matched with a business mentor from Zebra.
The students had the potential to win a first prize of £500 or two runner up prizes of £250.
𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗶𝗻𝗻𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗟𝗮𝘅𝗺𝗶 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗚𝗶𝗿𝗹𝘀 𝗦𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗼𝗹 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗳𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗰 𝗯𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗮: ‘𝗣𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗣𝗮𝘁𝗰𝗵’ – 𝗮 𝘀𝗺𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝗯𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗮𝗴𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲𝘀 𝗰𝗼𝗹𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘁𝗼 𝘀𝗵𝗼𝘄 𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗶𝗻𝗳𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻. 𝗖𝗼𝗻𝗴𝗿𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀, 𝗟𝗮𝘅𝗺𝗶! 🙌
Runners up where Daryl-Lee from Lydiard Park Academy and Salim, Aamir and Abdul-Rahim from Little Heath school. 👊
We are hugely grateful to the teachers who have supported this programme in school. Thanks also go to the business professionals who have given time to share their expertise to mentor and help the finalists through some important early thinking.
Most importantly we are hugely impressed and inspired by the talented young people who had the courage and determination to put themselves forward for the Cultivate challenge.
Lamxi is photographed with the panel of judges from Zebra and EBP CEO Kate Barrow.
October 2025
We’re delighted to share our Impact Report for 2024/2025:
September 2025
We’ve got a new look – same mission, fresh energy!
We’re excited to share our refreshed look!
Our new logo and colour palette reflect the energy, innovation, and ambition that drive our mission: inspiring the future workforce.
While our appearance has evolved to reflect our growth and development, our commitment remains the same. We’re still here to empower young people with the skills, confidence, and opportunities they need to thrive in tomorrow’s world of work.
Thank you for being part of our journey. We can’t wait to continue building the future together.
A huge thank you and well done to the team of marketing students from University of Reading who produced our rebrand redesign in such a professional and efficient manner. Wishing you all the best in your future careers!
February 2025
We are so grateful for all our fantastic volunteer Business Ambassadors who give up their time to support and inspire the young people that we work with.
Every year they give a total of 4500 hours of their time to help us, which equates to £2m worth of work hours over 30 years! They make such a positive difference, inspiring young people to think of a new career path and help to build skills and confidence.
We felt that a few deserved a special mention and we recently presented the following people with a volunteer award.
🌟 Helene Cooper – Dedication to EBP 🌟🌟
Helene has volunteered with EBP for over 12 years. Helene is very dedicated to EBP and we very much appreciate her commitment. Helene is really good at giving advice as well as talking about her own career path and workplace experiences.
🌟 Paul Rose – Most Active New Volunteer 🌟
Over the last 18 months, Paul has volunteered at 30+ events/workshops.
He is very much hands on, willing to present, hand out resources, guide students through the various activities. Paul is really good at giving advice as well as talking about his own career path and workplace experiences 🙌
🌟 Thomas Graves – Inspiring our Future Workforce 🌟
Tom is a relatively new volunteer. He really inspires young people and raises their self esteem. He is relatable to the students and has engaging conversations with them.
ALL our volunteers are very much appreciated, for the time they give and the commitment to EBP that they show. We could not do what we do without you!
Find out how you can volunteer with us:
Become a Business Ambassador! Volunteer and share your expertise – Education Business Partnership
January 2025
We are delighted to have completed Year 1 of our programme working with the James Ballantyne Memorial Fund.
We have impacted over 1900 young people by delivering 21 STEM based workshops across Swindon and Berkshire.
JBMF provides grants to advance the study of engineering and STEM subjects among budding young engineers.
Visit their website to find out more about James and the fund.
We’re excited to be working with JBMF again in the coming year to inspire even more young people.
Catherine and Warren from the James Ballantyne Memorial Fund are pictured here with students at one of our workshops.
October 2024
We recently featured in the Newbury Weekly News following the success of our Destinations Expo. Click the image to read.
We are very happy to share our Impact Report for 2023/24:
April 2024
We won the John Hampson Award at the NWN Best in Business Awards 2024
⭐ We are absolutely delighted to announce that EBP received The John Hampson Award at the NWM Best in Business Awards 2024. ⭐
This award is presented in memory of the late John Hampson who organised the awards for many years.
His son Olly said: “Dad’s genuine passion was championing young people and giving them opportunities to succeed in their adult life and so his award recognises the organisations that are committed to that goal.”
Congratulations to the EBP team and all of our Business Ambassadors, partners and supporters. 🙌
March 2024
Kind donation from Newbury Building Society
A massive thank you to Newbury Building Society for their £500 donation which will enable us to support even more young people.
We plan to use this funding for our Junior Citizens programme.
Junior Citizens is aimed at Year 6 pupils to raise their awareness of citizenship, personal safety and responsibility.
It gives pupils the opportunity to engage with organisations and cover topics such as keeping safe when out and about and online, and other varied social and environmental issues that may affect them as they transition to secondary school.
Work Experience Portfolio
Take a look through our Work Experience Portfolio and discover our full offer for schools:
January 2024
Our CEO on Kennet Radio
For anyone who missed our CEO, Kate Barrow, on the Kennet Radio ‘Saturday Chatterday’ show on Saturday 20th January 2024, you can listen here:
Kate talked about all the opportunities we have for businesses to engage with school students to inspire their future.
School Engagement Opportunities for Business 2023/24
Our new portfolio of opportunities for business is now available. Take a look and find out how your business can benefit from getting involved with our activities!
Destinations Expo 2024
If your organisation would like to book at stand at West Berkshire’s largest Careers Fair, take a look here for all the details!
Impact Report 2022/23
We’re delighted to share our Impact Report for 2022/23. It’s a quick, easy read that’s a celebration of our collective efforts. We hope you enjoy flipping through and getting to know us better.
Primary School Workshops
We are thrilled to introduce our Primary School Portfolio. With this portfolio, we now offer an extensive selection of workshops and events that create a safe space for raising awareness, building self-esteem, and boosting confidence among young learners.
We’re excited about our primary school offering because it enables students to start thinking about their future careers and gain insights into various job sectors. It’s all about sparking curiosity and helping them understand different opportunities available to them in the future.
Destinations Expo 2023
Thank you to all who supported our biggest Destinations EXPO event ever which took place last Thursday, 12th October 2023.
We had a fantastic day and received wonderful feedback from the students, teachers and companies who attended.
We welcomed around 1200 students who were inspired by over 65 organisations.
All made possible by our main funder Greenham Trust.
Find out more here.
EBP’s 30th Anniversary
This year (2023), we are excited to be celebrating our 30th anniversary!
We’ve come a long way and are extremely proud of our growth and our achievements each academic year.
~ We’ve got a fantastic team of 24 dedicated staff members, and we spread our wings over West Berkshire, Reading, Wokingham, Swindon, Oxford, and Hampshire.
~ We collaborate with over 70 schools, reaching almost 20,000 students through in-school events annually.
~ But that’s not all! We’ve teamed up with more than 900 businesses, and our incredible business volunteers generously contribute 4,500 hours of their time to support us annually.
~ And we organise a whopping 1,800 student work experience placements each year, opening doors to new opportunities.
A huge heartfelt thanks to everyone who has joined us on our journey!
Cultivate Final 2023
In July 2023, we held the Cultivate programme final and the winner was from Little Heath School. Congratulations!
This was a ‘Dragon’s Den’ style challenge involving students from the following Reading schools:
~ Little Heath School
~ Highdown School and Sixth Form Centre
~ Reading Girls’ School
~ Blessed Hugh Faringdon Catholic School
~ The Willink School
Well done to everyone who took part.
This event was funded, supported and hosted by Zebra Technologies.