SCENES – Screen East New Entrepreneurs Scheme 

About SCENES
SCENES is a free training and development programme for people from the East of England seeking to develop themselves as freelancers and/or their small businesses.
The scheme is funded in partnership with Skillset under the EQUAL programme, an ESF-funded development partnership formed in 2004 to stimulate and encourage new entrants to the industry from non-traditional and disadvantaged backgrounds.
The six-month programme of training, mentoring, business and careers development advice, plus real work experience with a regional production company takes place between January – June 2007.
At the end of the programme, participants will receive further funding for training, and those companies evidencing outstanding development will receive seed investment in their enterprise. The scheme will also signpost and support other opportunities and applications for funding available to participants.

About the programme
The development programme will include free innovative, creative training, complemented by a core curriculum of essential business skills. Participants will follow both a group programme of business-based training, as well as developing an individual programme of training defined in the original application interview and through ongoing discussion with Screen East and their attached mentor.
Each participant on SCENES will be matched to a relevant mentor from the region, who can assist both their personal and professional development. Like the training, there is no fee for mentoring services; SCENES is a fully-funded project which includes financial support for childcare and travel costs for participants on low incomes.
Every participant selected for the scheme will receive business development and ongoing careers advice from Screen East, including the use of an interactive business development toolkit, which has been developed by Screen East specifically for creative businesses and entrepreneurs.
The work experience element of the scheme, which comes at the end of the programme, will match up participants to relevant regional companies for a minimum one-week placement. Depending on your skills and interests you may find yourself working with an animation team; on production or sourcing new commissions and developing new ideas for factual television.

Eligibility
The scheme is open to any freelance, new SME or unemployed person living in the East who has a passion and ambition to develop themselves or their business within screen or moving image industries.
SCENES has set targets for recruitment to ensure fair representation of gender, ethnicity and socio-economic status and has extra support for travel and childcare included in the programme.
The scheme is for new entrepreneurs and companies from the region rather than established companies seeking either staff development or company development from Screen East. We run a number of training and development programmes for creative companies in the region and will refer more established applicants to these rather than to SCENES.

Application to the programme
Application to SCENES is made by one-to-one interview and Training Needs Analysis (TNA), ensuring that all applicants benefit from the scheme regardless of their success in getting on to the programme. The recruitment period for the scheme is November-December 2006; by Christmas 2006 we will have recruited and confirmed successful applicants to the programme.

To apply, applicants can request a one-to-one TNA with Screen East staff by emailing a cv or short history of their experience and aspirations to scenes@screeneast.co.uk or by calling 01603 776923. We will then get in touch to arrange an interview with you.

In addition to conducting individual interviews, Screen East is holding several application ‘surgeries’ with specialist advisors around the region in November – December, including events in Luton; Ipswich; Colchester; Cambridge and Norwich. Full details of upcoming SCENES surgeries can be found in the Events pages of our website.