North West Water is helping the UK’s Department of Education and Employment with a project to help truant children improve their school attendance record.
The company is preparing to take on ‘challenging’ youngsters this month from schools in north-west England, following the success of a two-year pilot scheme in which eight 14-year-olds spent a day a week with the company’s education team carrying out environmental and conservation work.
The project, part of North West Water’s Action Base Research Programme, managed to keep all eight children in school and produced a ‘marked improvement’ in most of their class work.
Manchester University is evaluating the results and the company has arranged meetings with head teachers from a further five schools.
North West Water, part of the United Utilities group, began in 1990 a long-term strategy to help disadvantaged young people. It set up a series of environmental education classrooms, of which there are now six, at sites on its land across the Northwest.
During the past financial year 10,000 children have taken part in this educational work.
The company also recently became the latest UK business to produce a combined social and environmental report.
The report reveals that a stakeholder survey found 73 per cent thought the company met or exceeded their expectations in fulfilling its social responsibilities.
The United Utilities group, of which North West Water is part, claimed the figures, gathered as part of an annual stakeholder survey conducted since 1996, show it has ‘built the foundations of a solid reputation’, but added: ‘the feedback shows we need to extend communications with our stakeholders about our community programmes’.
The survey sought the views of 440 customers, business partners, employees, consumer and environmental groups and opinion formers.
Overall the survey’s findings favoured the company, but revealed that only 16 per cent of those questioned felt the group had a ‘good or very good’ reputation for treatment of its employees.
Only one in three felt it had a high reputation for openness.