We have been working away at an exciting EU project called Narratives of Impact since September 2020 and last month we had our penultimate meeting in the fabulous city of Milan. The partners from Italy, Germany, Poland, Spain and myself (UK) got together to finalise the video guides that we have made to go along with a toolkit created for NGO’s, charities, and voluntary organisations to use storytelling to measure impact.

The toolkit is designed to help organisations, teams and individuals to use storytelling to to see what is working and what needs to be improved. Applying storytelling methods can really help to improve data collection and more importantly help improve services and delivery. Using different storytelling methods can help people to engage with data collection and learning processes in a creative way, enhancing inclusion and access, as well as interest and commitment. 

Each partner has worked hard over the past few months to create their own video guide and it was great to watch the final videos together whilst eating delicious Milanese pizzas. Marco from @COSV hosted us in the COSV offices in Milan and gave us a warm welcome. It was good to meet the staff and see where they do their important work.

The next step in the project is translating the toolkit into Italian, German, Spanish and Polish ready to be published in June.

Kath Peters, project manager, PVM.

After the events of May 2020 which saw George Floyd murdered by a police officer in Minnesota, the People’s Voice Media team were prompted to examine our own complicity in systemic racism. At the time we were a predominantly ‘white’ organisation, across all of our layers and we could not pretend that we did not have a road to travel.

However, we did not want to make empty gestures that would be quickly forgotten with no lasting impact. Instead, we wanted to have a long-term anti-racism strategy that would enable ourselves and others to hold us accountable. We wanted this to not only align with, but also inform, our overall strategy and vision for the organisation.

This has been a long process over almost three years, beginning with the setting up of a subgroup of our Board to work on the topic, and evolving through education, conversations, and active listening into what will be our Anti-Racism Vision.

Our Vision – which will be published on our website in the very near future – will not be an end point, rather a beginning. It lays out the next two years as a series of milestones for our team and Board members, our organisation, and the sectors in which we work. It recognises that becoming actively anti-racist is an on-going commitment with no final end point. As such, the Vision will be a living document. At the end of two years we expect to have more to add, more to do, keeping anti-racism at the centre of what we do, and at the heart of our goal to create a socially just work.

There is work to do and it is work we are already in the process of undertaking. During the past few years, our team and Board members have:

• Undertaken individual learning on racism as a systemic issue
• Developed a shared understanding that racism is a systemic issue and an issue we need to address on individual and organisational levels

As an organisation we have:

• Established initial relationships with partners who are led by people from communities with lived experience of racism
• Diversified the people who are part of People’s Voice Media in terms of race through changes to our recruitment practices

Within our sectors we have:

• Initiated conversations about systemic racism within those sectors
• Enhanced the racial diversity at events and workshops we host or are a part of

Our Anti Racism Vision will, as mentioned, be published in the near future. For now, if you have any comments, questions or feedback regarding our anti racism work, please do contact us at enquiries@peoplesvoicemedia.co.uk.

International Child Health Group (ICHG) are looking for organisations working with refugee and asylum-seeking young people to collaborate with them to produce a short film to celebrate Refugee Week in June.

ICHG are producing a short film showcasing community led art projects involving refugee, migrant, asylum-seeking children and their families, sharing reflections on their dreams.

ICHG see the film as a means of denouncing anti-migrant racism, hostile rhetoric and policy and hope it will build solidarity among health professionals, VCSE groups and the public to resist and challenge harmful and unjust policy.

They’re are asking organisations to invite the children, young people and families they work with to draw, paint and create art pieces reflecting on their hopes, wishes & dreams. Each piece should also be accompanied by a written description explaining their ideas.

ICHG are asking that organisations then email a photo of each piece of artwork and its description to minpinamy2@gmail.com by Monday the 15th May.

The images will be included in a two minute film with possible animation of some of the artwork. They hope this will humanise people seeking sanctuary, give platform to the voices of children and young people and challenge the narrative around forced migration. The film will be available to share on social media platforms in time for Refugee Week (19th June). In advance of this they would send participating organisations a copy of the film for review and if you are happy with the product they can include your logo.

If you’d like to get involved – get in touch with them via the email listed above!

The Home? Project was set up last year to create a space to give Migrants, Refugees and Asylum seekers a voice to speak about their lived experiences in Northern England with the view to change the narratives that surround migrant communities. The project hopes to serve as a vehicle to drive the message home that things need to change for the better. Common themes and key findings from the stories will be created as an animated film and distributed in the wider community such as schools, colleges, universities, museums, libraries, informal education settings, councils, community groups and grassroot organisations.

These stories have been gathered through using PVM’s methodology of Community Reporting and Archive Research training.

PVM has partnered with 5 crucial partner organisations spread across the Northern region to train volunteers to become Community Reporters and begin the story gathering / sensemaking process.

We kicked off our first community reporter sessions last year in October with Refugees Women’s Connect based in Liverpool and completed the Community Reporter training at the end of February with Methodist Asylum Project in Middlesbrough.

There’s been a variety of stories and feedback shared from people that convey many different challenges and successes when entering the UK. For example, as English is not the native tongue for most people migrating to the UK, it has been difficult to find work or know where to turn to get appropriate advice and direction. However, people found that the longer they have stayed in the country, they have met other people in the same or similar position through charity organisations and have made friends and received knowledge on steps to take to get educated into English culture. They become familiar with the organisations that have been setup to help aid migrant communities. With these developments, some of our volunteers have reported that their experience has become more positive over time as they learn the language and expand their knowledge and communities.

With government coming down hard on migrants and bringing in new legalisation that will make a migrant’s life even harder, it is crucial that the lived experiences of migrants in the UK are heard and action taken to improve their lives and well-being.

Our 5th annual conference is set to take place in Liverpool this summer!

The conference will focus on the value of lived experience and how this can be used as a tool for creating equitable futures. We’ll explore how lived experience stories can help to address systemic issues such as racism, ableism and sexism that are currently damaging social progress.

The different sessions in the conference will focus on one or more of the following:

Insights: What we know from people’s lived experiences about present day inequalities and how equitable futures could be achieved

Methods: Techniques for working with lived experience as a tool for helping us to think about the future

Actions: What practical things we can do now to begin to create a more socially just future for ourselves and our communities

So, what’s going to be happening?

Take a look at our video breakdown below:

Whilst we’re currently at full capacity, don’t panic, you can add yourself to the waitlist below or follow the link to Eventbrite here. We’ll be checking in with those who have registered at regular intervals over the next couple of months – and allocating any last minute cancellations to people on the waitlist.

We can’t wait to welcome the network to the Women’s Organisation in July – see you then!