Station Adoption Scheme

A group of students from Archbishop Beck Catholic Sixth Form; Faye, Joe, Rachael, Conor, Louis, Rebecca and James, along with their teacher Dawn Bond, as part of their BTEC Business course, have been asked by Sally Ralston on behalf of Merseyrail to organise an event for the company due to the link between Merseyrail and Archbishop Beck. The launch of the Station Adoption Schemes at Merseyrail stations are important for the community as it shows the work that local volunteers who are part of the Local Residents Association put in, to make the stations look nicer and to help prevent vandalism and littering. In the past, other stations have launched their Adoption Scheme, however, this time Archbishop Beck have been lucky enough to be able to be involved by planning and running this event at Rice Lane Station on the Kirkby-Liverpool Central Line.

Three local junior schools have been included in the Station Adoption event; Blessed Sacrament, Longmoor Lane and Rice Lane. These schools have been able to get involved by taking part in a competition which was set up by the students, where they went out to the schools and did a presentation to explain what station adoption is and asked the children from the schools to produce posters based on how the community should look after their stations. From the entries collected, one winner was selected and the child of the winning poster received a £30 voucher, was invited to the event with their parents/carers and had their poster displayed at the event to be kept at the station. Prizes of £10 vouchers were also given out to the runner ups and every child who entered received a selection box, then in the New Year, all posters will be printed onto banners and placed along the Merseyrail train lines.

The launch event took place on Thursday 7th March at Rice Lane Station at 11.30, the people who attended the event included; The Lord Mayor, staff from Merseyrail including the Managing Director of Merseyrail, staff from Archbishop Beck including Senior Management and the Head of Sixth Form, Members of the residence association and the competition winner from Blessed Sacrament and her family.

The Launch didn’t just open the station adoption scheme but it will also included the unveiling of the winning poster competition about the importance of looking after your local community.