It was great to catch up with our front line #PowerToChange community partners on Friday 20th June. As always lots going on and despite the challenges our young people and communities face lots of much needed work going on. This included:
- Raising awareness of the needs of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities.
- Offering support to Prisoners families.
- Providing front line support to African and immigrant communities.
- Running foodbanks.
- Producing activities and materials to support Prisoner families and children.
- Supporting young people to be creative and to use this as a way of speaking out on issues of concern to them.
- Running free family activities at the MAL centre
- Helping people save money on energy bills
- Voices of Hope for Black History Month
- Providing sports and arts opportunities for young people
Rob Watson from Decentred Media ran a session on community media and how the community groups could seek to partner with community media as an effective way of getting local news and views to local people. Rob shared:
Community media is about things you care for rather than about , in the same way you care for your garden but might care about the environment. Its local and about things that impact on you and things you want to change
Rob Watson, Decentred Media.
In discussion all present felt that the city council should seek to place community media hubs in community centres and libraries, as a way of encouraging and supporting communities to have a voice . Going forward the group are keen to link up with Rob and the community media network to explore how we can partner together to bring about change. There was a consensus that local community media is a vital part of local democracy and development.
We ended the meeting by looking at the role of community workers and Aaron from Leicestershire Cares shared the following:
Community workers are HOPE DEALERS, we give people hope, and that hope is the spark that leads to change
This led to us making a “talking head video” where we asked participants to identify where the hope is for young people and community groups:
the hope is within, the skills, knowledge, and strengths the young people and community groups themselves, who need to be supported to come together to bring about change
We are looking forward to taking this work forward on the year ahead and working strategically with young people, community, public and business sector to bring about long term systemic change.
I always leave these meetings with a greater sense of connection and feeling positive about the future
More info
Link to talking hope video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awKA9nCL3Ug
Decentred media https://decentered.co.uk/
More info on our #PowerToChnage model https://www.leicestershirecares.co.uk/about-charity/our-approach/power-to-change/