Steve Brine met up with a group of soldiers and officers from Worthy Down’s Army School of Education on Wednesday 17th October.
The Army School of Education is based in Worthy Down and supports selected serving soldiers wishing to attend Army Officer Selection Board and civilian applicants who have been successful at achieving a place at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst (RMAS) but are considered a ‘risk pass’.
As part of the three month Potential Officer Development Programme (PODP) the school works on developing their practical application of intellect, physical ability, cultural broadening and ability to communicate.
The PODP is the single largest social mobility programme run across the three services and provides around 10% of the RMAS Commissioning Course intake.
As part of the PODP they take their soldiers into London on a number of occasions to support training serials including; art and theatre, religion and society and leadership and government. On the 17th October the course spent time in London exploring and understanding the parliamentary system, and they joined Steve Brine to hear more about how Parliament works, his various roles and to take part in a Q&A session, before they spent the afternoon observing select committees.
Steve Brine said: “What a really interesting and engaging session. I was extremely impressed at the informed questions, including the threat of antimicrobial resistance and its threats in the developing world, where we also discussed the complications that a drug resistant virus would have on disaster planning.
“It was also good to hear how Worthy Down is doing right now after we saved the site in 2010-2011, and the group were a real credit to the School.”