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The Trust was set up in 1965 with the aim of helping young people entering their working life. Based at Nuneaton the charity was called the Young Peoples Centre Ltd, later being renamed Lindley Lodge. There was certainly a need for the work back then and Lindley quickly became recognised as a quality provider of personal development programmes for young employees. Companies started to ask Lindley to provide training for adults, based around such themes as effective communication and leadership. This was the early days of Teambuilding and Management Training.
The next major step for the Trust was the move to Masham in North Yorkshire, in 1976 Swinton Castle was purchased from Lord Swinton. This very grand building became the new home of the Trust, which was to become Lindley Educational Trust. Swinton Castle became renowned for its management training using the outdoors. Within its grounds the Claire Centre worked with young people. This period saw the growth in the use of the outdoors as a medium for training and development.
[Annual Report 1976-77]
Lindley continued to be a very popular training option with increasing numbers of companies wanting their young employees to undertake a residential event. In 1978 Lindley acquired the Hollowford Centre at Castleton. The Diocese of Sheffield had run Hollowford Centre for a considerable number of years. This centre was very popular and made good use of the surrounding hills, caves and crags.
[Hollowford mid 1960’s]
In 1985 Lindley Lodge at Nuneaton was sold and the Trust focused its activities at Swinton Castle, Claire Centre and Hollowford Centre. During this period management training was seen as a means of generating a surplus to support the young peoples work. From the mid 1990’s this became increasingly difficult, companies now wanted their Management Training to take place closer to work and increasingly chose hotels as their accommodation option. Also during this time period the popular YTS scheme came to an end, this saw a reduction in the number of young employees attending programmes. In 1998 Swinton Castle was sold and is now a very popular 5-star hotel.
[Annual Report 89/90]
Lindley’s only centre was now Hollowford, but the Trust continued to work from a range of different venues across the UK. From 2003 Hollowford further developed its young peoples work, offering personal development programmes for schools and youth groups. In 2004 the Trust made a commitment to focus on the development of young people under the age of 25 years.
2008 saw another development in the Trust’s activity, Shining Cliff near Ambergate in South Derbyshire. There was a need to have a small, dedicated youth centre to support the work with challenging and vulnerable young people. This 20-bedded centre will open in 2009.
[Annual Report 07/08] |
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