TESTIMONIALS

We’re incredibly grateful to the teachers, heritage professionals and community partners who have supported Local History Hub since its launch. Their encouragement and shared belief in the value of connecting schools with local heritage organisations continue to shape our work. Below are a few words from some of the people helping us build a national network of teacher-led local history hubs - strengthening community connections and inspiring the next generation to discover the stories of where they live.

Kate Smith, English Heritage

“Local History Hub is a platform which supports open and clear communication between educational providers and heritage organisations. This makes a huge difference to the educational opportunities which support children's understanding of local history and the importance of conserving the past for future generations. Overall, Local History Hub has a huge role in building community connections and community resilience.”

Jenny Wilkie, Tees Valley Museums

“In the past, as a museum consortium, we have always reached out to teachers to share our offer. This is "reversing the narrative" making it easier for us to engage with large numbers of teachers at once. I hope the teacher focus will enable us to continue to share the excellent work we are already doing, and hopefully this will take us into new directions, ever responding directly to the needs of teachers and schools across the region.”

Sarah Grundy, Historic Places Team, Lincolnshire County Council

“Local heritage is an incredibly rich resource for learning, engagement and enjoyment. We are very keen to share this resource in innovative and exciting ways with our children and young people.”

Hannah Saxton, Hyndburn Borough Council

“We can't do all this work alone and having a network of partners and experts will be hugely valuable.”

Emma McKenna, The King's School, Grantham

“Local History is so important in our curricula as it connects our students to the world they are learning about. It helps them to see how History connects to them and to their local area. I am looking forward to collaborating with other schools and organisations to improve the local history we currently offer our students.”

Alex Blakemore, Leicester Cathedral

“As a heritage venue, we really value education and have developed our learning offer based on early consultation with a teacher focus group. We would like to now build on this and develop pre and post visit session materials. A way to do this is by working with schools in the Local History Hub and really identifying what would be useful in the classroom so that we can develop effective resources.”

Chris Corbett, Teeside Archives

“As a part time member of staff in a small heritage team, collectively we just don't have the resource or capacity to be as proactive linking with schools as we'd like to be. A Local History Hub could be a great way of letting schools know what we currently have and to explore efficient and effective ways of embedding our collections in future programmes.”