Tower and Town, February 2020

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Editorial

What do young people do in Marlborough? What is there for them to do, to join and to enjoy in their free time? This edition is not a survey, more a series of snapshots, but the picture is broadly two-fold. There are a lots of clubs and organizations of various sorts. Several of them are represented in the following pages: activities busy with scores of participants and an impressive number of committed and enthusiastic adults running them - though more volunteers are needed everywhere.

Tower and Town is grateful to all those who have kindly contributed in writing or allowed themselves to be interviewed. For lack of space, there is more going on than meets the eye here, including a whole range of activities at the Leisure Centre.

But there is another side expressed by one of the contributors:

“My personal opinion as a parent in Marlborough: there are LOADS of opportunities for clubs, eg ballet, tai chi, guides, scouts, cadets, penguins swimming, gymnastics and so on, but there are not enough ‘rainy day’ ‘turn up and do’ activities for youth, eg places to hang out, cinema, milkshake shack, indoor skate park, without travelling to Swindon.”

In the effort to redress this, you will also read in these pages of the crucial work of Lisa Farrell, Janneke Blokland and others (mostly with older children and teenagers) whose impressive efforts need more support to fill this gap.

John Osborne