Learning at the Pub: Bar school

Where can you learn how to save a life, sign with the deaf and cook a fantastic meal? Well, increasingly, it seems, you can do all of these things down the pub.

Politicians have been telling publicans for a while now to diversify - the rationale being that if you look after your local community it will look after you. And former pubs minister John Healey's action plan to save the British pub - backed with a £1m pot of funding - urged pubs to offer more to their local communities as a survival strategy. But it appears that pubs have been mixing things up for a while now. Whether it's IT skills, arts and crafts or gardening, pubs have it covered.

The Nightjar in Worle, Somerset, for example, is to have its adult education classes recognised this Friday with a National Open Doors Award from the Adult Learners' Week initiative. The Hall & Woodhouse-owned community pub is run by licensee Di Bradley, who has organised courses at the pub in basic IT, signing for the deaf, and art.

Di has also set up a pub library and a monthly community pop-in café - where organisations can come in and teach one-off classes on subjects such as gardening, home composting and home safety. The pub regularly hosts church meetings and services and Di is currently looking into running a craft club. She says: "I am open to all ideas, and find a way to do it or find someone who can."

Di has been fundraising for her local community for years, and she says setting up the courses was a natural extension of this. But it was while she was talking to a pub regular who happened to work for the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) that Di found she could get trainers to come to her pub and run free courses. "She finds out what is available and I find out what interest there is," says Di.

Sign of the times​

The first course, on sign language, ran 18 months ago. After sourcing five laptops from businesses in the local area and setting up wi-fi in the pub, the LSC ran a basic IT course. This started in January and targeted those who had no experience of using computers.

"When that finished people didn't want to stop coming," says Di. So she enlisted the help of some of her regulars - a teacher and two IT specialists - to continue the course. Di argues that the pub offers a unique environment for adult learners, where they can feel more relaxed than in a formal classroom setting. This point has also been proved at the Grays Inn in Aberdeen, which runs a similar IT initiative. Its computer training group, run with the local council, takes place on Monday afternoons. A tutor on hand can help with questions on computing, writing CVs and job applications.

Briony De'Ath runs the Enterprise Inns pub the Unthank Arms in Norwich with her husband Nick. When the recession hit they wanted to get more use out of their function room. "It can hold 50 or 60 people and it isn't enough just to use it a few times a week," says Briony. One solution has come in the form of a weekly mothers and toddlers music group, which started in January. She adds: "We are hoping that these will take off even more in the summer because they will have the garden to use."

Briony agrees with Di that pubs' informal atmosphere gives them an advantage over more venues for courses. She argues that traditional venues such as church halls can have a bit of a cold image attached to them, especially when compared with the warm and welcoming environment of the pub.

And while the financial benefits might not be immediately apparent, Briony argues that running courses is a way of having an edge over the competition. She explains: "If people feel that you are somewhere that will do something for them, they are probably more likely to support you than your competitors."

Hosting courses will also expose your pub to new potential customers. As Di at the Nightjar says: "I have to have the place open and the electricity on, and so running these courses brings people in who wouldn't normally come in here."

A real lifesaver

At the Thatchers Arms in the tiny village of Mount Bures, on the border of Essex and Suffolk, licensee Mitch Adams runs a first aid course that could be a matter of life and death for local residents. Mitch explains that the first aid course run at his pub was a recruiter for the Community First Responder volunteer organisation run by the ambulance service. In rural areas where an ambulance may be delayed in reaching a heart attack victim, Community First Responders based locally are sent to the scene ahead of the emergency services.

They are trained in the use of basic life support and defibrillation - the sooner a heart attack victim receives this treatment the more positive their prognosis. Previously, the nearest First Responder group was based eight miles away. "Now we've got our own group for our own community," says Mitch. "If there's a problem we have got local volunteers who would be on the scene much more quickly than the ambulance."

Meanwhile, not too far away the Five Bells in Colne Engaine, near Colchester, Essex, has gone one step further. As well as running first aid courses and helping to recruit local First Responders, it is home to the village's very own defibrillator and trains locals how to use it. Owner Darran Lingley is "top of the list" of 11 locals who can use the machine, which is located in its own special case outside the pub. "It's a very simple thing to have on site but it will save a life," says Darran.

A warm welcome for all

But being part of a community also means supporting its more vulnerable members, as the Station Hotel in Ashton-Under-Lyne, Lancashire, has done by agreeing to help local customer Dan, who has Down's Syndrome, finish his training. The pub Dan had been working at had closed down when he was halfway through the Personal Development Qualification that would help him to get work. So the local branch of learning disability charity Mencap approached the pub for help. The Station Hotel was already a favourite with Mencap clients and their carers, as pub manager Pauline Town explains. "They know they are going to get a warm welcome - the thing with the Station is it doesn't matter who you are, what you are, you will be accepted," she says. "What we get from carers all the time is that they know they won't get shoved in the corner next to the toilet."

Together with licensee Andrew Stanworth - who previously worked in the NHS as a carer for 12 years - she has decided to offer training placements to other Mencap clients, which will start in September.

And so from being a place where you can meet all sorts of people, the pub is already diversifying into a place where you can learn all sorts of skills. Some of these are helping to improve the quality of life and sense of community, while others are literally helping to save lives - all of which is helping to save the pub.

Tips

• Stick with it and don't be disheartened if a course doesn't immediately take off - people need time to make it a part of their routine.

• Try to get locals or local organisations involved in running the courses.

• First aid skills should only be provided by a qualified practitioner or training organisation, as should technical skills such as IT.

• Be reasonable in your expectations - you might not be able to charge a local group much, if anything, but you will generate goodwill.