COPC and Unloc team up for inspirational Portsmouth celebration

Portsmouth’s rich and diverse communities, who come together to make our city great, were celebrated at the annual City of Portsmouth College Community Dinner, delivered in partnership with Unloc, last week.

The city’s education, governance and business leaders, together with COPC students and staff, gathered at the Square Tower on Portsmouth seafront for a night of great food, great networking and great conversation, with speeches from guest speaker Motaz Amer, Unloc chief executive, Hayden Taylor and COPC principal and CEO, Katy Quinn – all under the banner of Celebrating Community Cohesion.

Hayden said: “I think community dinners like this are important because it's a chance to celebrate our city. It's a chance to recognise the role that the City of Portsmouth College plays in educating people young and old, and it's a chance to bring different people together to have conversations that they wouldn't otherwise have had. So, for me, this is a really special moment.”

Katy added: “It means everything to work with our amazing students on events like this. Because that’s what the College is about. It’s about learning, it’s about opportunity, it’s about helping people make the most of their lives and just find that inspiration.”

Away from the dinner table, COPC students had organised fun activities to celebrate Portsmouth in various ways. A “hook a duck” game reflected the tradition of seaside games, while an exhibition of the students’ hidden gems of Portsmouth shone a light on places less travelled. Finally, the guests came together to create a piece of interactive art, using puzzle pieces.

Among the COPC students representing the College was Level 2 Art & Design student Amelie Bampton.

Asked what it meant to represent the College, she said: “I think it's special because I mean, City of Portsmouth College is a great college for one.

“I think that we all have connections with different companies and different events so we can all come together with our ideas and make Portsmouth a more enjoyable place for visitors or people who already live here.”

David Lycett, assistant principal at COPC said Portsmouth meant resilience, history and education to him. “I think it's about opportunities for young people and everybody really, not just young people and the future,” he added. “The job markets are changing, technology's changing. So, it's getting people the skills so that they can harness and get into those opportunities in the future.”

Gemma Nichols, chief executive of Portsmouth Creates, said events such as this dinner were a fantastic opportunity to engage with Portsmouth talent.

“It's important that we are all working with young people across the city to give them as many opportunities as we possibly can. We've already done a lot of work with City of Portsmouth College and it's just been fantastic – the students, and their creativity in particular, is just phenomenal.”

MP for Portsmouth North, Amanda Martin, agreed: “There's so much potential talent this city and this College is fizzing with like talent and innovation and young people,” she said. “And I think what we need to do, and particularly in my role in government, is to make sure we can show paths for people, not just on a bit of paper, not just at a jobs fair where you walk away with a bag that gives you some goodies. So, for me it's about making sure that we allow young people to have the very best opportunities.”

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