Design Skills Alliance without funding

The Design Council remains without Government or private funding for the UK Design Skills Alliance, two months after announcing its joint initiative with Creative & Cultural Skills.

The Design Council remains without Government or private funding for the UK Design Skills Alliance, two months after announcing its joint initiative with Creative & Cultural Skills.

The alliance is seeking £5.3m over three years to help profes – sional designers gain new skills, and to raise teaching standards in schools and colleges.

The Design Council has fund – ed the project to the tune of more than £500 000 so far – a figure set to rise as the alliance appoints a design consultancy to rename and brand it, recruits a senior project manager, and ‘develops some early content’.

‘We can’t sit and wait endlessly for investment, so the Design Council is putting funds into the pot,’ says UK Design Skills Alliance interim director and Design Council head of skills Lesley Morris. ‘We will support this work on a continuing basis, but need to fundraise to make it happen. This is still an industry- Government partnership.’

The news comes as the Department for Innovation, Uni versities & Skills announces a £200m fund to improve training facilities in schools and colleges that serve the finance, cons truction, science, engin – eering and IT sectors. It is not yet clear whether design could also benefit.

The alliance now hopes to attract funding after the launch of its new branding, possibly at the London Design Festival in September.

‘Once you create something more tangible, it is easier to secure funding,’ Morris says.

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