Peoples Voice Media and its partners within the VOICITYS project have recently hosted two Conversation of Change events on the topic of life in diverse neighbourhoods. Bringing together the research findings from the project such as Community Reporter stories and interviews with decision-makers, the events prompted discussions and ideas generation about a range of key topics.

The first event was specifically for residents and stakeholders in Charlestown and Lower Kersal (CHALK) and it explored:

• How physical and social change impact on each other
• Ways to involve people in change processes to overcome the ‘fear of change’
• How CHALK has a resilient community and good community assets
• The importance of spaces for people to meet and interact, and how this helps communities to connect and grow

The second event, What Does Diversity Means to You?, brought together project participants from cities across Europe – Berlin (Germany), Budapest (Hungary), and Sassari (Italy) with the people from CHALK. It addressed a number of questions centred around diversity by comparing key understandings of what diversity means to people across the four cities. This discussion then looked at key policy ideas for enhancing the assets of diverse communities and how these communities can begin to create positive change for their neighbourhood. The results from this event will contribute to the local consensus meetings in which residents and other stakeholders will finalise their ideas for their area.

Watch this space to see how the project progresses!

We’ve been made-up with the response to our Co-creating (public) services with stories of lived experience symposium. The symposium is part of the first annual Institute of Community Reporters conference running in June 2019, and this specific event will bring together people from across Europe within and outside our network to explore and discuss the power of stories.

As part of this thought-provoking and participatory 1-Day Symposium, you will:

• Listen to a case study on how the Making It Real framework has used insight storytelling, and get involved in a practical storytelling activity delivered by Community Reporters from TLAP and the National Co-production Advisory Group (NCAG).

• Take part in an interactive story curation session led by the Our Voices project and AQuA who have been piloting the methodology in their work.
• Get involved in a workshop exploring how Conversation of Change events can be used to co-design policy recommendations run by the VOICITYS partnership

The symposium will conclude with a collaborative keynote led by the CoSIE consortium in which quick-fire, inspiring and provocative talks on co-creation in public services will be delivered by people who access public services, practitioners and academics. You will be invited to get involved in this discussion and share your thoughts on co-creation approaches.

If you’d like to be a part of the dialogue, book your ticket here before they go! 

Last month we launched a brand new project over in Yorkshire called #softandfluffy.

Partnering with Creative Minds and the University of Huddersfield, the Community Reporter movement will be working with participants from Creative Minds projects across Yorkshire to gather stories about the role that creativity plays in people’s lives. As part of this project, we will be delivering training sessions that people can attend to become a Community Reporter and learn how to tell and capture stories as well as running storytelling sessions at which you can come and share your stories. All of the stories gathered will go onto www.communityreporter.netand become part of our online storytelling community.

With the stories gathered, the Community Reporters will work alongside Creative Minds and the University of Huddersfield to pick out some findings from them and use these to help us understanding how people value creativity and what impact it has on their lives. We will package this learning as short report and edit the stories into a film that will be shared publicly. 

At the end of the project we will run a workshop that will take key learning from the stories and use it to support health and social care services to think about how creative activities can support people wellbeing.

Watch this space, to see how the project progresses! 

Earlier this month we worked with education professionals from a set of Spanish universities to train them in Community Reporting methodologies as part of a 5-Day Erasmus+ funded project. This 5-Day programme provided the attendees with an introduction to Community Reporting and how it can be used to support the gathering, curating and mobilising of stories of lived experience. As part of the programme, participants took part in storytelling activities, developed digital skills, learned about story analysis and became Silver Members of the Institute of Community Reporters.

During the training, the participants focused on gathering stories about how education professionals used digital technologies and the roles they played in their lives. Using our dialogue interviewing methodology they collected 8 stories and analysed them using the ICR’s framework. From this, the group produced a short report and edited video based on the findings.

The project they are a part of is a learning exchange in which participants explore different digital practices and think about how this learning can support their work with older people. They will be producing a book (in English) on their learnings and our practice of Community Reporting will feature in it… so watch this space!

For now, anyone who speaks or reads Spanish, can download the report they produce during their training below or have a listen to the stories in their edited video here.

As part of the Institute of Community Reporters 1st Annual Conference – From the margins to the mainstream: Putting people’s voice at the heart of decision-making processes – we are pleased to announce we are running a 1-Day symposium focused on co-creation in public services.

Co-creating public services with stories of lived experience: A 1-Day Symposium
Thursday 6th June 2018 / 9:45am – 4:30pm / Engine Room @ The People’s History Museum, New Ct St, Manchester, M3 3ER.

Join us and learn about the practical implementation of the Community Reporting methodology in the co-creation of public services across Europe through a mixture of case study presentations, participatory workshops and panel discussions. The symposium programme will include:

• A case study on how the Making It Real framework has used insight storytelling, and a practical storytelling activity delivered by Community Reporters from TLAP and the National Co-production Advisory Group (NCAG).
• An interactive story curation session led by the Our Voices project.
• A workshop exploring how Conversation of Change events can be used to co-design policy recommendations run by the VOICITYS partnership.
• A collaborative keynote quick-fire, inspiring and provocative talks on topics pertinent to co-creation in public services led by the CoSIE consortium

Be a part of this dialogue and sharing event, and bring your experience of working with people’s voice and stories of lived experience with you! This event is being organised collaboratively between People’s Voice Media, the Institute of Community Reporters and the Our Voices, VOICITYS and COSIE projects.