We train parents, both to ride bikes, and, if they are interested, to become cycle trainers. We train to Bikeability (National Standards) assistant trainer and fully qualified instructor levels, and then employ suitable parents as cycle trainers.

We aim to recruit local people, especially mums, and train them up to become cycle trainers. We feel that this achieves a number of objectives:

• once cycling, these local people will act as effective role models to their friends and neighbours, and encourage them to think about starting cycling themselves.
• a mother will pass on the skills she learns to her children. In this way teaching one key adult enables a whole family to benefit - for free.
• Children who receive cycle training in school will further benefit by having the interest and support of a cycling parent, and will be much more likely to be allowed to ride on road. This therefore adds value to existing provision.
• Locally recruited mums will be able to relate better to the local population whom we are trying to encourage to take up cycling, because they will often speak the same language, share the same background and understand shared concerns.In this way they will make more effective cycle trainers.
• by creating a job for someone who would not otherwise have have had one, we can lift a family out of the poverty trap, and hopefully into a lifetime of more fulfilling opportunities.
• Locally recruited and trained people share a sense of loyalty to each other in the organisation, tend to stay longer and be more involved.

This is another reason we start training much younger children. Their mothers are often at the stage in their lives where they are looking for a new start. This is perhaps the first time for many years, since their babies were born, that they have a few hours to themselves, once the children start school. They are very committed to their children's education, and feel the school is 'their' place; it is the one place where people of hugely diverse backgrounds, cultures and religions, come together. It is 'safe' and people feel a sense of ownership in Primary Schools that you cannot once your children grow older and go to Secondary School.

It is therefore an ideal place in which to offer training. Suitable Mums (and Dads in some schools) in the adult cycle club have been informally approached and asked if they might like to have a go training to be a cycle trainer. Often this is met with mirth (and unprintable replies!) from novice cyclists. But actually many DO go on our Primer Training course to brush up their own cycling skills, and get some first-hand experience observing, and then assisting, experienced trainers.