Adam heads to the USA for Social Cohesion project

A Birkenhead Sixth Form College student has won a place on a prestigious exchange programme for young people, run through the US Embassy to promote social cohesion.

Adam Probbing, who is coming to the end of his first year at the College, beat hundreds of applicants to get accepted onto the scheme, which is facilitated by Legacy International. The organisation aims to ‘train and mentor community leaders, helping them to develop and implement practical, community-based solutions to critical issues’.

A member of a Wirral youth panel and recently appointed part of the Student Leadership Team at the College, Adam’s strong application was backed up with two impressive video interviews to earn him a seat on the plane in July.

Along with 19 other 16 to 18-year-olds, he will spend more than two weeks in the North East of the US, with the time split between Washington DC, Philadelphia, Charlottesville in Virginia and Durham in North Carolina.

Explaining the reasoning behind the project, Adam said: “It’s about communities sticking together and being strong through different methods, but also different people and cultures coming together. I’m hoping to learn some good ideas about social inclusion to bring back to the UK from the US, and I’d like to and try to use some influence to implement the ones that are suitable in our area.”

A former student at Ridgeway High School before coming to the College, Adam studies Politics, Geography and PE at A Level, and has a particular passion for Politics.

Assessing the US political landscape and social cohesion, he said: “All the places that we’re visiting like Philadelphia and Charlottesville have had to do something about addressing issues like racism and general racial tensions. They realise that without acting, it can become a hostile environment, so I’m interested to learn about the measures that they’ve taken for social inclusion.

“I just think knowledge about other cultures and races is key to breaking down stigmas and stereotypes. Once the barriers come down and people are tolerant of each other, communities rally together. A lot of it is a fear of the unknown, so being educated about things outside of your own experiences and comfort zone means that people can treat each other as equals, just as human beings.”

He concluded: “I’ve not been to the US before so I’m excited about getting to see what the real America’s like, not just what I’ve seen on films and TV.”

To learn more about studying Politics at Birkenhead Sixth Form College, click here.