More about Walsall

More About Walsall

Walsall is a large town and Metropolitan Borough in the West Midlands of England. As part of the conurbation it is an industrial town famous for its leather industry and has a wide range of leisure, cultural and educational facilities. A new Art Gallery is due to open in 2000 and a large part of the town centre is developing as a leisure and retail centre to complement the more traditional shopping centre and well-known market.

Bloxwich is an ancient village which was long ago taken over as part of Walsall and is now the centre of large housing estates and provides a range of facilities including the Public library with a theatre attached. T.P. Riley Comprehensive school, named after a prominent local man, serves a large part of Bloxwich. As well as the loan of books and music CDs this busy Public library has a Flexible Learning Centre which has provided free computer services for the public since 1995, now including Internet Access, word processing and CD-ROM information and tutor sessions provided by the Walsall College. There are regular 50+ and Mother and toddler group meetings in the library and a programme of Author visits. The Library Theatre acts as a venue for many performances from Shakespeare to pantomimes.

Darlaston is a town to the south of Walsall and again is the centre of a large housing area. The town was an important engineering centre in the past but since the decline of that industry has relied more on service industries, helped by the recent opening of the Black Country Route nearby. The Public Library is a focal point for the town centre, being an imposing modern building opened in 1987. People from many cultures live in the Darlaston area and the library provides books, music and videos in Punjabi, Urdu and other Indian languages as well as English. Darlaston Library has a Flexible Learning Centre with 8 computers which is very popular as well as a full range of library activities. Darlaston Comprehensive School is a 11-18 year school for all the community.

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Walsall Public Library Services is part of Walsall Council’s Leisure and Community Services. There are 20 libraries, 5 with Flexible Learning Centres, Mobile libraries and the home library service. The library service has traditionally provided a local point of access to learning, education and information. Within its core aims and values it seeks to meet the needs of all members of the community through the course of their whole lifetime, and to ensure that no-one is excluded or disadvantaged from being able to access resources to support personal self-development, whatever their circumstances.

Click here for Walsall Libraries web site

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