People’s Voice Media recently worked with Dr. Dayo Eseonu from Lancaster University on a research project investigating racial justice and equality that saw us work with racially minoritised young people in South Manchester as part of a 3-day Community Reporting programme. Tony, our facilitator, shares his experiences of the programme…

The participants are young people (13 to 15 years old) who were attending Rekindle’s summer school in Hulme, Manchester. I was tasked with equipping the young people with Community Reporting skills to share their lived experiences about their experience of place from a racial justice and equality lens.

There was so much that resonated with me about this piece of work as it brought up my early years of experience of education and racial injustice. As a part of my preparation, I visited the school’s website and was immediately impressed with the school’s ethos and especially their strapline “The school you wish you’d attended”.

There were some challenges on the project, such as the age range of the group being slightly younger than I had expected and each day having slightly different participants (rather than the same group throughout). However, I adapted the session plan to keep the young people engaged with a variety of participative activities and I was mindful of a conversation that we had previously had at People’s Voice Media, wherein we spoke about giving ourselves the permission to be creative. Technical issues with the recording kit meant that the stories we gathered couldn’t be used as recordings due to sound quality but we were still able to get rich insights from the young people about their experiences of growing-up in the city. They developed skills in interviewing and storytelling, even if the technology failed us! 

Working on this project it was important that I created Timothy Clarke’s four stages of psychological safety in order to make it a space in which the young people could share lived experiences connected to racial equality and justice:

1. Inclusion Safety: People feel comfortable and wanted in a group.
2. Learner Safety: People feel able to ask questions, try things out and make mistakes. (The group did this in bucket loads!)
3. Contributor Safety: People feel safe enough to share their own ideas without being embarrassed.
4. Challenger Safety: People challenge other group members’ opinions including the group leader’s opinion. Fostering the culture of safety to challenge meant that young people were able to have ‘brave space conversations’ which are more meaningful than safe space conversations.

It is these pillars that enabled us to have so many insightful, challenging, productive and human conversations throughout the three days. 

Overall, the sessions were fun, there was a point when one of the young people asked me about my motivation for working with young people and I paused, looked up and another young person was trying to fit an elastic band around his head… I explained that it is moments like these that I relish working with young people.

The HOME? heritage project funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund has been focusing on the collection, curation, and dissemination of lived experiences of migrants (including refugees, people seeking asylum and other migrants) living in Northern England over the last 10 years. 

In August we pulled together the feedback gathered from the 5 Knowledge Exchanges in the 5 areas during Refugee Week in June and the Pan Northern Knowledge exchange in July in Liverpool. We are now collating the feedback to create roadmaps/action plans for each area including an overarching one for the North of England.

A total of 117 people attended the Knowledge Exchanges and people in each of the areas had the opportunity to hear people’s oral histories about their lived experiences of coming to live in the UK. 

The Knowledge Exchanges gave the wider community the opportunity to learn about this heritage, provoke discussion around the issues and people came up with ideas to input into a local road map/action plan that will help to – 

• disseminate the learning.
• create actions that help people to develop compassion and understanding. 

People said the event had inspired them to “get more involved”, “pay more attention”, “speak out more” and given them greater awareness. One expressed an intention to start volunteering. People demonstrated a shift in attitudes. One response described how they would “talk to people more positively about new migrants”, while another stated they would “be more aware of the importance to make people more aware of the similarities we share with asylum seekers, why they come and should not be a competition for resources, housing or jobs”. Another answer described how the event had left them feeling “more excited to be positive and keep working hard to adapt to life as a newcomer in the UK”. These responses show a positive personal impact on some of the attendees of the events.

The main key ideas that came up from the Knowledge Exchanges are:

• Campaigning for better rights for Migrants, Refugees, and asylum seekers – this includes the right to work, better housing, better financial help, better health support and more legal support.
• Connecting support services together more effectively.
• The need for specific trauma informed mental health support.
• Creating more activities for people to combat social isolation, especially for young men.
• Better targeted health care support for women.
• More ESOL support.

The feedback from the Knowledge Exchanges and the roadmaps will inform project resources that are being produced now, in phase 4 of the project, which is focusing on Widening Impact by producing –

• an educational toolkit – this will be a resource pack for organisations and individuals to use.
• a website – the stories, newspaper database and toolkit will be available from the website.
• a local newspaper story archive/database
• an animation – which will also be part of the toolkit and screened across the 5 areas in early 2024.

During each Knowledge Exchange there was also the opportunity for people to sign up to get involved with the project and many people have signed up. In response to this we are currently planning more Community Reporting training, Archive Research Training and Train the Trainers training that will happen from Oct through to March.

In the bustling heart of the Black Country, a transformative initiative is stirring waves of change, reshaping our interactions with healthcare systems. The partnership between People’s Voice Media and Wolverhampton Voluntary and Community Action has created the space for an inspiring endeavor: Community Reporting within the Black Country Integrated Care System.

In a world where countless stories often go unheard, Community Reporting emerges as a beacon of change. This visionary project bridges the gap between citizens and healthcare systems, capturing the everyday experiences of those accessing health services. It illuminates the intricate nuances that shape our interactions within the healthcare and care systems, enabling local people to have a voice.

On Day 1 of the workshop, seven local individuals embarked on a transformative journey. With fervent curiosity, they delved into the world of Community Reporting. Techniques such as snapshot storytelling took centre stage, showcasing diverse ways stories can be woven, captured, and shared. 

At the core of Community Reporting lies the belief that every voice holds value. This principle reverberates throughout the process, linking stories with individuals and organisations capable of driving positive change. It weaves a rich narrative tapestry, offering a real world view of lived experiences that might otherwise remain unheard.

Beyond traditional healthcare boundaries, this two-year project overflows with innovation. The Integrated Care System framework finds a potent ally in Community Reporting, identifying what works and unravelling transformational opportunities. The project promises to infuse the Black Country’s healthcare landscape with a vital wave of innovation.

As we navigate this inspiring narrative, the potential for profound change becomes evident. Community Reporting empowers individuals and communities, forging connections, and nurturing empathy. Together, as participants, storytellers, and advocates, we amplify voices. We are crafting a future where every lived experience contributes to a healthier, more inclusive society.

The  report to the COVID Inquiry has now been completed. It has been sent to the COVID Inquiry team and you can access the report here. Below you have a summary of some of the key points and links to the conversations that PVM had with people, to give you a preview of what the report includes. 

Links to extracts from 6 of the 22 participants

Keymn explains why having an understanding of the value of lived and living experience is training that healthcare professionals must have.

Miro explains why society has to re-think and understand disability differently.

Amanda tells us why COVID information was not fully accessible for Deaf people and what could have been done differently. 

Andy explains to Isaac the reasons for involving people with lived and living experiences.

Hameed discusses both the positive and negative aspects of the pandemic.

Baroness Brinton talks about health and social care problems that were highlighted during the pandemic.

Links to full conversations with all participants

The PVM process starts with individuals narrating their experiences, facts and feelings. We did this by talking to 22 people as part of the joint work with DRUK, so that the lived experiences of Deaf and Disabled people could be input to the COVID Inquiry.

There was one point in the process, where the information given by individuals seemed overwhelming. This was partly because everything felt important and relevant, but also because the task of determining key themes seemed a difficult or limiting process.  For example, when it felt as though every point people made was important, it then seemed like we might be trivialising the topic if we tried to distil it to a few main aspects.

However, the PVM process means that meaning emerges, although this doesn’t happen by magic.  We listen and highlight what we think is important. We might colour code, group together or count how often topics are talked about. We also consider how frequently a contributor might return to talk about a lived experience, as an indication of how strongly they feel about the issue.

For the COVID Inquiry work, we began with some open questions to allow people to give their lived and living experiences in a broad way and in their own words. As the work progressed, and by the time we had recorded 10 narratives, we were able to include some more focussed questions, e.g. Other people have said _____, did you find this was the same for you or what was your experience of this? There was definitely the need to balance the open questions against more focussed ones, because we did not want to lead the participants down a specific route, but we were aware that being able to give the COVID Inquiry team specific details would be important.

In the report we’ve included direct quotations from many of the people who shared their lived experiences. Where necessary, we’ve also offered explanations, based on the conversations and online sense making workshops we held. This is because we wanted to clarify for the Inquiry why particular aspects were different or difficult for Deaf and Disabled people. The key points from the report are:

·  There was confusing and frightening information from national government and local authorities to Deaf and Disabled people.

·  COVID both highlighted and exacerbated existing systemic problems and Inequalities (including racism, ageism and ableism) within statutory services

·  Even though there is legislation, little understanding exists about Deaf and Disabled people’s needs.The report is comprehensive and has had an emotional impact on some readers. We hope it will give people’s voices meaning so that the COVID Inquiry can make recommendations that will support Deaf and Disabled people, together with their carers. As Keymn Whervin stated in the foreword to the report: “The Inquiry must ensure that people affected by COVID have their voices heard, particularly in respect of how we co-produce health and social care”.

Isaac Samuels

As, we have previously shared with you, Disability Rights UK (DRUK) & People’s Voice Media have been working in partnership to record people’s lived experience narratives and insights about the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns. We are now ready to share the results of this work with you.

The Stories

During the project, we had the privilege to hear from people about their first-hand experiences of the pandemic. Many of these stories are difficult to hear but it is important that we listen and learn from them. We’ve create a playlist of key extracts from the some of the stories shared, that includes:

• Keymn explaining why having an understanding of the value of lived and living experience is training that healthcare professionals must have.
• Miro exploring why society has to re-think and understand disability differently.
• Amanda telling us why COVID information was not fully accessible for Deaf people and what could have been done differently.
• Andy explaining to Isaac the reasons for involving people with lived and living experiences.
• Hameed discussing both the positive and negative aspects of the pandemic.
• Baroness Brinton talking about health and social care problems that were highlighted during the pandemic.

You can listen to this playlist here.

And to listen to all of the experiences gathered relating to the pandemic, head to this page on the Community Reporter website: https://communityreporter.net/covid-conversations

The PVM process starts with individuals narrating their experiences, facts and feelings. We did this by talking to 22 people as part of the joint work with DRUK, so that the lived experiences of Deaf and Disabled people could be input to the COVID Inquiry.

The storytelling process

Isaac – the person who led this work, describes how in one part of the process, the information given by individuals seemed overwhelming and it was difficult to decide what are the key points we should communicate to the inquiry. This was because everything felt important and relevant and because the task of determining key themes seemed a limiting process.  It felt as though every point people made was important and felt like we might be trivialising the topic if we tried to distil it to a few simple ‘key points’ or ‘recommendations’.

However, the Community Reporting curation process (part of which was done with the storytellers themselves) means that meaning emerges from the stories and we are able to work with the detail and the nuance of people’s individual experiences. This doesn’t happen by magic. We listen and highlight what we think is important. We might colour code, group ideas together or count how often topics are talked about. We also consider how frequently a contributor might return to talk about a lived experience, as an indication of how strongly they feel about the issue. This is a multifaceted approached that allows us to work with both the individual stories (and highlight individual people’s voices) but also stories as a set of data.

For the COVID Inquiry work, we used dialogue interview and open questions to allow people to give their lived and living experiences using in their own words. As the work progressed, and by the time we had recorded 10 narratives, we started to ask people’s perspectives on topics that emerged in the other stories. There was definitely the need to balance the open questions against more focussed ones, because we did not want to lead the participants down a specific route, but we were aware that being able to give the COVID Inquiry team specific details would be important.

The findings

In the report we’ve included direct quotations from many of the people who shared their lived experiences. Where necessary, we’ve also offered explanations, based on the conversations and online sense making workshops we held. This is because we wanted to be clear about why particular aspects were different or difficult for Deaf and Disabled people. The key points from the report are:

• There was confusing and frightening information from national government and local authorities to Deaf and Disabled people.
• COVID both highlighted and exacerbated existing systemic problems and Inequalities (including racism, ageism and ableism) within statutory services
• Even though there is legislation, little understanding exists about Deaf and Disabled people’s needs.

The report is comprehensive and has had an emotional impact on some readers. We hope it will give people’s voices meaning so that the COVID Inquiry can make recommendations that will support Deaf and Disabled people, together with their carers. As Keymn Whervin stated in the foreword to the report: “The Inquiry must ensure that people affected by COVID have their voices heard, particularly in respect of how we co-produce health and social care”.