On Thursday 19th January Patrick Foster from ‘Epic Risk Management’ came in to be our guest speaker for the Pengelly Society meeting – our cultural guest speaker programme for the Sixth Form which meets 4 times a year.

Patrick is a reformed gambling addict who gambled almost £500,000 over 12 years in a variety of ways. His addiction was born through a roulette machine and ended up with 76 different online gambling accounts. He talked about the importance of reaching out for help early on, recognising that you have a problem and also being wary of modern day society and how easy it is to gamble. 20% of adverts on TV are run by the gambling industry which is worth £15 billion a year to the UK economy. In the modern day, gambling addiction can manifest via online games and loot boxes – with games like FIFA23 being criticised for this aspect in recent times. Online gambling is the fastest going issue amongst young people, thus parents/guardians/staff/pupils need to be aware of the risks involved.

Please click on the following WeTransfer link to access some resources on gambling and addiction which Patrick encouraged that we share with parents/guardians for discussion with their young person: https://we.tl/t-cLtOSlmnQq.

Patrick and ‘Epic Risk Management’s’ Twitter and Instagram details are the following – he is more than happy to be contacted:
@patrickfoster02
@epicpgc
@epicriskmanagement
@patchfoster

Lastly he has also written a book about his life story, a story which the Sixth Form found quite emotive but also carried a very strong message – https://linktr.ee/mightbite

The next Pengelly Society meeting is on Thursday 23^rd March 5-6:30pm with Jo Wimble-Groves, co-owner of ‘Active Digital’, on the topic of entrepreneurship.