The Cookie Bar & Bicycle Repair Shop – Alternative Provision, Community Impact and Future Plans

We caught up with George Pickersgill, Head of Alternative Provision to find out more about Future Pathways and their affiliation with The Cookie Bar.

Over the past few months, The Cookie Bar and Bicycle Repair Shop in Hindhead has quietly but powerfully evolved into something far more than a café and workshop. In partnership with the Leo Lion Foundation, it has become a place where young people who have struggled in mainstream education are rediscovering confidence, purpose, and belief in their own futures.

What Has Been Happening on Site

Through Future Pathways, the Alternative Provision arm of Pathways Community Trust, we have been piloting a business-led Alternative Provision model embedded within a fully operational café and bicycle repair shop. This approach places young people in a real workplace rather than a simulated environment, giving them authentic responsibility, routine, and a sense of belonging.

Alongside Alternative Provision placements, The Cookie Bar has continued to offer structured work experience opportunities to local schools, including Undershaw School. These placements have enabled both pre-16 and post-16 learners to gain meaningful exposure to hospitality, customer service, and vocational environments, often acting as a stepping stone into longer-term provision or post-16 pathways.

The Bicycle Repair Shop has been at the heart of this early AP work. Over a seven-week placement, students attended one day per week in a calm, structured, and purposeful environment. The impact was immediate and measurable.

Attendance on placement days reached 100%, with students consistently arriving on time or early—often a significant shift for learners with a history of anxiety, poor attendance, or school refusal. Importantly, this engagement translated back into school life, with both learners improving to over 90% school attendance by the end of the placement.

Students developed practical bicycle repair skills alongside wider employability skills including communication, teamwork, task engagement, and self-confidence. Social and emotional outcomes were equally powerful, with staff observing improved emotional regulation, resilience, and willingness to engage with adults and peers. Students spoke openly about feeling calmer, more focused, and proud to be learning “real skills” that felt relevant to their future.

Leadership and Capacity for Growth

To support this next phase of development, we have recruited Laura, our new Vocational Learning & Café Manager. Laura will oversee both the day-to-day operation of The Cookie Bar as a community café and the delivery of Alternative Provision across the site. Her role brings vital leadership capacity, ensuring strong safeguarding, high-quality vocational learning, staff development, and a seamless blend between education and enterprise.

With dedicated leadership in place, the site is now well positioned to move from pilot delivery into a more structured, sustainable, and scalable model.

The Cookie Bar as a Community Hub

Beyond education, The Cookie Bar is developing into a vibrant community hub for Hindhead and the surrounding area. The café remains a welcoming public space, intentionally designed to bring together young people, families, residents, and visitors to the Devil’s Punch Bowl.

We have already begun to explore this role through creative and cultural activity, including an art workshop hosted with local artist Ezra Gokcen, which brought together community members and young people in a shared, creative experience. Building on this success, we plan to expand our evening and community events programme throughout 2026, including art exhibitions, creative workshops, music-led events, and community gatherings aligned with wellbeing, creativity, and inclusion.

These activities not only strengthen community connection but also create additional opportunities for young people to build confidence, showcase their talents, and see themselves as contributors to a wider social and cultural space.

Looking Ahead: The Future of the Site

Looking forward, The Cookie Bar and Bicycle Repair Shop will operate as a multi-strand Alternative Provision and community enterprise hub. The site will continue to offer:

• Commissioned Alternative Provision placements for young people aged 11–16 at risk of disengagement

• Ongoing work experience placements for local schools such as Undershaw

• Post-16 pathways for young people who are NEET or not yet ready for employment

• A thriving community café and bike repair shop open to the public

• A growing programme of evening and community events

Learning will rotate across the café, bike workshop, kitchen garden, digital hub, and creative spaces, allowing young people to discover their strengths and build confidence through real-world experience. Impact will continue to be evidenced through attendance data, accredited outcomes, employability tools, and rich qualitative case studies, ensuring transparency and accountability for partners and funders

Why This Matters

What we are seeing at The Cookie Bar is clear evidence that when young people are trusted, supported, and given meaningful opportunities in real environments, transformation happens. Attendance improves. Anxiety reduces. Confidence grows. Futures begin to feel achievable again.

With the continued partnership and belief of the Leo Lion Foundation, this site is not only changing outcomes for individual young people but also laying the foundations for a replicable model that blends education, enterprise, and community in a powerful and sustainable way.