Archaeological Contractor – Bradbourne Re-bourne Rejuvenate

Description

Sevenoaks District Council (SDC) wishes to improve the facilities available to the communities surrounding Bradbourne Lakes. Development Phase Funding for this purpose was approved mid-2024, with most of the funding coming from The National Lottery Heritage Fund. Delivery Phase application is submitted in November 2025 for approval in March 2026. Part of this project includes a funded two-year (in 2026 and in 2028) heritage and archaeology-led intervention working with young people. This will take the form of an adapted version of a Historic England (HE) project known as Rejuvenate. Project Rejuvenate in 2023 followed work exploring how Historic England might work collectively to use heritage and archaeology as a tool for building self-determination and resilience in vulnerable young people. This brief relates to that element of the Lottery-funded programme only. The successful contractor is required to design a version of the Rejuvenate model applicable to the Sevenoaks Bradbourne Lakes context. It is expected that this will take the form of 5-week session, intervention around a theme with bespoke activities. The Bradbourne Rejuvenate project will take the form of a working partnership between Sevenoaks District Council (SDC), archaeological and heritage organisations, West Kent Mind (WKM) and Sevenoaks District Community Safety Partnership (CSP), all working to create interventions that will help young people encountering significant disadvantage to reach their full potential. SDC is delivering Rejuvenate as part of Bradbourne Re-bourne project as project lead, HE as Quality assurance, CSP as supply and support mechanism, archaeologist specialist as delivery execution and WKM admin and support. WKM offers guidelines, mental support scaffolding and safeguarding lead but leaves archaeologist more creative freedom to deliver an interesting programme. The Rejuvenate initiative developed by Historic England, forms a key strand of the wider Bradbourne Re-Bourne project, which aims to restore and interpret the historic Bradbourne Lakes and engage local communities in understanding their ecological and heritage value. The project will use archaeology and heritage-based activities to improve wellbeing and life chances for vulnerable young people, particularly those at risk of involvement in anti-social behaviour. In this iteration, the contractor will need to devise the programme collaboratively with West Kent Mind as a co-partner. Details of their ‘offer’ are set out within this document. Discussion with West Kent Mind at the earliest stage is therefore a prerequisite of this project. Money for independent evaluation of the results of the project will be covered from within the broader Lottery project, so there is no need to quote for independent evaluation report. However, the project will need to deliver evaluation material in partnership with West Kent Mind and in line with earlier Rejuvenate projects, and budget time for communication with an evaluator and producing the project evaluation material.