Former actress uses skills to help young people stay in education

A Tameside-based business has secured £56,000 in innovation funding to develop a digital programme aimed at helping young people at risk of long-term absence from school.

Michaela McCormick, founder of Empower Coaching and Performance, and a former actress with credits in Coronation Street, Doctors, and Hollyoaks, is developing an online learning platform for pupils aged 11 to 14. The programme uses performance techniques and exercises to help young people build confidence, emotional resilience, and self-belief.

The business says the programme has been developed in response to concerns about poor school attendance and the barriers that anxiety and low self-esteem can create for young people trying to engage with education.

In Greater Manchester, around one in five children were recorded as persistently absent from school in 2024, according to the Greater Manchester Attendance Action Alliance.

McCormick, a professional actress and entrepreneur, originally established Empower Coaching and Performance to help adults improve their communication skills and overcome limiting self-beliefs.

She said her own experiences helped shape the decision to adapt the business to work with secondary school pupils:

“I know from personal experience how confidence struggles can affect every area of life.

"While acting helped me find my voice, coaching showed me how powerful it can be to help others find theirs.”

The new digital programme will feature interactive games, learning videos and guided audio exercises. It is designed to support pupils experiencing issues including anxiety, low self-esteem, imposter syndrome, and poor attendance.

The platform is expected to launch in November 2026.

McCormick said the aim was to give young people practical tools to build resilience and confidence while helping prevent personal challenges from becoming long-term barriers to learning.

The project has received support from the Greater Manchester Combined Authority's Foundational Economy Innovation Fund and GM Business Growth Hub's Innovation Service.

An initial £11,000 investment from the Foundational Economy Innovation Fund led to McCormick working with innovation specialists from the Business Growth Hub from September 2025.

Advisers helped her refine the business proposition and develop a pilot programme with input from schools, teachers, and parents.

Following a successful pilot in Tameside, the Business Growth Hub continued to support McCormick with a second investment application, resulting in a further £45,000 in funding to develop the digital platform.

Neil Simpson, Innovation Account Manager, Foundational Economy, at GM Business Growth Hub, said McCormick had a clear vision for supporting young people and had developed it into a commercially viable business model.

He said the work had involved researching the market, setting targets, and developing a pricing structure.

McCormick said the support had helped her turn the original idea into a clearer business model:

“I knew the impact I wanted to make, but their input gave me a proper model – who it was for, what problem it solved and how we could prove it worked."

The business is forecasting an increase in turnover of £45,000 as the new platform is launched and plans to work with 15 schools during its first year.

McCormick has also set an ambition of signing up every secondary school in Manchester by 2030.

Yvonne Grady, Director of Innovation and Digitisation at GM Business Growth Hub, said the project demonstrated how identifying a community need could lead to a new commercial opportunity.

She said Empower Coaching and Performance's product was on track to support student engagement and wellbeing in schools across Greater Manchester.