GRANTS of up to £1,000 are available from East Bolton Regeneration for community groups.

Organisations helped recently include Bradford Street Relate Centre for counselling for youngsters; Breightmet Sutton Residents Association to convert a house into a community centre; Darcy Lever Cricket Club for equipment and to seed their pitch and the African, Asian and Afro-Caribbean Focus group to support the needs of ethnic communities in the area.

If you would like an application form, please contact Sue Dooley on 01204 334334.

Bridge first

A UNIQUE system has been used to strengthen a local bridge. Council engineers and contractors J. Murphy Ltd used a reinforced concrete arch to strengthen Turner Bridge. The majority of work has been done from underneath to minimise disruption to motorists, saving £250,000 in the process.

Young poets

A LOCAL poet worked with Bolton schoolchildren in workshops designed to boost their self-esteem.

John Siddique hosted the sessions for pupils at St. Columba's and The Moss Primary Schools. They listened to John's poems and then expressed their own ideas.

We Can Do it!

THE We Can Do scheme has been running arts projects in 17 schools across Breightmet and Tonge.

Activities have included poetry, photography, dance, and drama and culminated in a showcase event at the Octagon Theatre and Breightmet's Rughill Fair.

Local musicians helped Bolton pupils compose their own songs. Mike Amatt, Nat Biney and John Maycraft worked with youngsters at Castle Hill and Red Lane Primary Schools.

The youngsters' compositions, 'School Life' and 'Going To The Lakes' were then recorded onto CD.

Top praise

A REPORT from the Audit Commission has praised the customer relations strategy of the Council.

Inspectors noted the Authority's friendly staff and the provision of information.

The Council is planning to introduce further improvements in the way customers can get information.

Reading is fun

HIGH Street Library in Bolton hosted some fun events to get more young people to read.

Activities at the launch of the 'Everybody's Reading' project included henna and silk painting, a live performance by local band Saagar Melodies. A starter pack is also available to all new members aged 16-25 which includes a free loan of a CD and a Talking Book.

It was a huge success with over 100 people taking part.

On stage

A LOCAL theatre group helped Bolton school children to develop performance pieces, as part of the We Can Do project.

The scheme has been running arts projects in 17 schools across Breightmet and Tonge.

Jodie Lamb and Steve Fairclough of Activ8 worked with pupils from Moorgate and Tonge Moor Primary

Schools, using movement, speech and improvisation.

Our world

SCHOOLS in Blackrod, Horwich and Bolton have joined a new government scheme, which links schools across the globe.

Pupils and teachers visited Brunei in South East Asia, South Africa and Maryland in the USA, as part of the Teachers' International Professional Development.

In the news

A local journalist has been teaching Bolton children about the role of newspapers in a weekly workshop.

Alison Barton of the Bolton Evening News worked with pupils from St Osmund's RC Primary and Bolton

Parish CE Primary School.

They were set a number of tasks, including news and feature writing and researching and interviewing.