Earlier this month, the Our Voices team met in Berlin to define the last actions to take before the end of the project later in the Summer. With the products finalised, it was the moment to value the whole experience that lead the consortium to create a Digital Curator Curriculum, Digital Curator Toolkit and Story Curation Resource Bank.

The project started in 2016, when the consortium began to find ways to give a voice to the unheard and change perceptions within society. Nearly three years have passed since then and an innovative methodology based on the use of digital technologies to create impactful stories and promote positive change in communities, has been created. As part of this process, a new concept – that of digital curation – has been developed and pushed forward in different countries across Europe.

Funded via the Erasmus+ programme, the partners have been testing the products created and are now focused on their adaptation to different local contexts and sectors. The adaptability of the outputs has been defined as one of the main strengths of the project and each partner is currently working to tailor the products to their specific sectors and stakeholder needs. As part of this process, we here at PVM will keep delivering trainings using the products, disseminating them at events and look for new funding opportunities to expand this work further.

We hope that the methodology will keep being used in meaningful ways and if you’d like to find out more and access the products produced, then visit the Our Voices website. The contents will remain accessible and we are sure you will make a good use of them!

One of PVM’s current project involvements in Eurospectives 2.0. The project aims to create a European curriculum for digital storytelling, empowering learners and teachers.

Earlier in June, we attended the third project TNP meeting, hosted by project partners, the CFR centre. Over two days, we made exciting progress on the project and even found time to enjoy a well-earned dinner. You can read all about it here on the Eurospectives blog.

Last week we were back with the CoSIE Horizon2020 project in Valencia, Spain working with entrepreneurs to support them to tell their stories using Community Reporting methodologies.

Over two days, a group of 7 entrepreneurs joined us to explore how video storytelling techniques could help them communicate to others how they became entrepreneurs, what motivates them, what challenges they’ve encountered on the way and how they’ve overcome these, and what successes they have had. As part of the training, the entrepreneurs got to grips with video recording techniques, using them to capture short snapshot stories about their experiences as part of the Spanish pilot – the Co-Crea-Te co-working and mentoring space. They then used storyboards and mind maps to pull together their ideas about their entrepreneur journeys, before bring these ideas to life on video and with photographs. They then used basic editing skills to combine them together in to short films.

Their stories shed light on important issues about co-creation and entrepreneurship such as how people came to their ‘a-ha moments’, the value of mentoring and coaching, how to make the best use of your talents and interests, how to build effective networks and much more. There stories will be appearing on the Community Reporter website soon… so watch this space!

It’s not long now until the 1st Annual Institute of Community Reporter’s conference – From the Margins To The Mainstream: Putting people’s voice at the heart of decision-making processes – is happening, and now to accompany our main symposium, we’ve got some exciting fringe events running throughout June to tell you about!

Narratives, the stories that people choose to tell about their own experience, are of increasing importance in decision-making processes and are instrumental to creating new ideas, ways of doing things and ultimately bringing about social change. With terms such as ‘co-design’, ‘co-production’ and ‘co-creation’ becoming the popular discourse in a range of industries such as academic, public and third sector support services, and local and national Governments, it is imperative to explore what the practical implementation of these terms means and how they bring about – or not – the inclusion and utilisation of a wider diversity of people’s voices into decision-making realms. The conference’s fringe events are taking place in different locations in the North West and Yorkshire, and are picking up on key aspects of these subject matters, as well as providing practical training and workshops on them. So, what have we got coming up?

Our first fringe event take’s place in Huddersfield. Working with the University of Huddersfield and Creative Minds as part of the #softandfluffy project, People’s Voice Media will be using the Our Voices story curation methodology to begin to analyse the stories about creativity and wellbeing that the project has been gathering. This staff training day, on the 4th June, will equip people working in creative, wellbeing and community settings with the skills to make sense of the insights in stories of lived experience co-produce findings from them.

We will then be in Stockport later in the month working with a team of people from children’s services, again using the Our Voices method, to help us to use insights from stories of young people’s relationship with support services to help direct a local strategy.

And finally, our fringe event tour will end at Liverpool MakeFest on the 29th June, where team member Hayley will be giving an Ignite talk on changing the world, one story at a time as part of their ‘what life might be like in 2049’ theme. Exploring the learning from the Digital Curator Toolkit, produced as part of the Our Voices project, Hayley will be linking its application to real world contexts and sparking a discussion about storytelling and social change.

Watch this space to see how our conference programme rolls out!

It’s only a few weeks until the sell-out, Co-Creating (Public) Services with Stories of Lived Experience symposium. We’re now really excited to launch our full programme, you can see the full programme here.

At the event, academics, people who access services, co-creation facilitators, service providers, local municipalities and public services, and third sector organisations will come together to explore how people’s own experiential knowledge can be used to inform service design and implementation, policies and much more. The speakers are from across the UK and Europe and offer different perspectives and experiences of co-creation. Their sessions will examine how the power of people’s stories can be used as part of co-creation activities and their own learning about this. The event promises to be dialogue provoking, active and a great opportunity to meet people involved in co-creation and exchange ideas.

If you’ve not got a ticket, you can still join the waiting list.