The Ruskin Mill Centre for Practice (RMCP) is a higher education provider under the umbrella of the Ruskin Mill Trust. The Trust, founded in 1983, is a fully regulated independent education provider for young people with special educational needs and behavioural challenges, using its unique method of Practical Skills Therapeutic Education (PSTE) - traditional crafts and organic farming in nature-based settings - as a means to work with issues ranging from basic physical coordination to the capacity to represent themselves as a contributor in the wider world.
Ruskin Mill Trust has a significant history of collaboration with a variety of academic institutions, such as the University of Oslo, the University of the West of England (UWE), and Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences. This history led the Trust to establish RMCP as its own dedicated higher education provider for its staff and external applicants via a design and deliver collaborative validation partnership with the University of Huddersfield.
The Trust’s method of PSTE has its underpinning philosophy drawn from the work of Rudolf Steiner as educational philosopher, John Ruskin as social critic, William Morris as practical craftsman, and also from a range of contemporary disciplines such as: psychology – executive function in special education; education – special needs, craft pedagogy, inclusion; and nature-based approaches. The Master’s in PSTE offers an academically rigorous development path that enables students to critically explore, evaluate, compare and develop the Ruskin Mill method through research and reflective practice.
