Glasgow thematic report
Edited on
12 September 2017Themes: Communication for Engagement
The Glasgow meeting of the Roma-NeT partners was the third set of working group meetings to take place in the Roma Net pilot delivery phase. After the kick-off in Paris in January when the themes of the working groups were decided - the first meeting occurred in Nagykálló Hungary, the second In Budapest-these two meeting followed each other during the same week. But our reduced number of partners meant that having two working themes and separate meetings was not practical. So we retained the themes and combined the meetings. Our key theme in Glasgow was ‘Communication for Engagement’
The aims of the Glasgow meeting were:
- To consider what is the basis for effective engagement?
- To give partners time to discuss and agree the aims and purpose of the pilot development in each city.
- To agree a collective aim and purpose
- To support each other to identify their short and long term priorities
- To consider what can actually be achieved by the end of the Pilot Delivery phase
- To discuss the Roma- NeT Pilot Delivery communications plan and ask partners to contribute to this
The Agenda is included below. It included a masterclass from Nora Ritok of the Pearl Foundation of Hungary talking about her experience working with some of the most marginalised Roma communities on the Hungarian border. She has spent several years developing trust in her working relations with communities living in deep poverty and unable to find routes out of their situation.
Nora told partners of the work she has done to incentivise parents to keep their children in school and to build skills for the adults so that they can create a community business using their skills in design and crafts. She also talked about the use of language and how we must be careful not to ‘dumb-down’ the language we use to describe just how shocking the conditions are that are being experienced by many Roma across Europe.
A second masterclass was also given by Professor Colin Clarke of the University of the West of Scotland on the language we use around Roma Inclusion.
Additionally, we heard personal stories from Margo Uprichard of The Space Govanhill and an update on structural funding from Andor Urmos, DG Regio, European Commission.
Partners participated in workshops facilitated by the Expert Team to consider the aims of the agenda. Partners had visited Govanhill on previous visits to Glasgow, which is the area of Glasgow where most Roma live. On this occasion they attended the celebration event of ‘The Big Noise’ in Govanhill: A community project that works with children and young people across multi-ethnic backgrounds in primary and secondary schools to teach music and give them the opportunity to be part of an orchestra and learn a musical instrument.
Agenda:
Wednesday 18 June
Arrival of participants
19:30 | Dinner, Café Gandolfi, Albion Street, Glasgow Merchant City
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Thursday 19 June
08:30 | Meeting of the participants at the hotel’s hall for transfer to Samaritan House, 79 Coplaw Street, Govanhill, G42 7JG
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09.00 | Welcome to Glasgow – Mr Tom Turley – Glasgow City Council Introduction and background on local area – Marie McLelland, Glasgow City Council
About the Pilot Delivery Phase – and Aims of the Pilot Workshop 2 Meeting – Ann Hyde, Lead Expert
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9:20 | Introduction to the theme: Communication and Engagement, Bela Kezy, Nagykallo Setting the scene for the Master Class – things to think about during the story telling. |
9:30 | Master Class - What is the basis for real community engagement?
The Hungarian experience - Nora Ritok, Nagykallo |
10:45 – 11.00 | Coffee |
11.00 – 11.30 | The Glasgow Experience - Margo Uprichard, The Space Govanhill
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11.30 – 11.45 | Rapid thinking time – note taking - in pairs
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11.45 | World Café - First set of table meetings – sharing their experiences discussing the key factors of building community relations – answering questions - . Perspectives from:
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13.00 – 13.50 | Lunch |
13.50 | World Café - Second set of table meetings – sharing experiences discussing the key factors of building community relations.
Discussions on Communication and Engagement. Perspectives from:
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14.30 – | OPERA session –
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15.00 | Feedback from each city. – How will you put this new knowledge to work – How can it inform your actions at local level?
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15.30 | Site Visit – Big Noise Govanhill, Sistema Scotland |
19.30 | Dinner – Café Source, St Andrews on the Square, 1 St Andrews Square, Calton, Turnbull St, Glasgow, Glasgow City G1 5PP |
Friday 20 June
09.00 | Meeting of the participants at the hotel’s hall for walk to The Lighthouse, Mitchell Lane, G1 3NU
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9:30 | Andor Urmos, DG Regio, European Commission
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10.00 – 10.30 | The aims of the Pilot Delivery Phase, Actions and indicators - Ann Hyde
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10:30 – 11.00 | Priorities for local actions
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11.00 | Coffee
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11.30 – 13.00 | Priorities for local actions - continue previous session
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13.00 – 14.00 | Lunch |
14.00 - 15.30 | Roma Net Communication Activity – Alicia Clyde What we all need to do to deliver better communications for Roma-NeT PDP. This session will give partners an opportunity to consider how they will deliver their communications within the project and how we can all work together to capitalise on the project and on all of the project work we are doing together and locally.
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15.30 | Colin Clarke – University of the West of Scotland The Language of Roma Inclusion
Where are we now? What is the power of language? Opportunities and Risks ? How to put this to use in cities.
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16.00 | Final Group thinking –
What have we learned? How will we use it? Are there gaps in our knowledge How can we fill them?
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16:30 | Close of Meeting
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19.30 | Free evening |
Action Planning:
The meeting gave partners time and opportunity to work on action planning for their Pilot Delivery Network locally and to share with each other their plans and make adjustments as necessary. It also gave partners the opportunity to consider how they would capitalise on their actions both locally and for the project.
The three key themes which all partners wanted to focus on to deliver pilot actions with their LSGs were Community Involvement, Building capacity within their LSGs and Communications. The table below shows areas that partners discussed for their future action planning:
Community Involvement | Building Capacity within LSGs | Communication |
Involving teenagers | Capacity building for public service employers | Build better data collection systems |
Working with young people | Future Leaders programme | Lobbying |
Working with mothers | Developing more /stronger networks with NGOs | Better working with Journalists/the media |
Working with fathers | Be ready to deliver LAPs for URBACT III | Identify key journalist associations |
Joint Roma and non-Roma community-building/ awareness-raising | Understand and raise awareness to relationship between LAP and new programming period | Capitalise on the thematic guides – translate and update? |
‘Human library’ | Develop better governance | Develop case studies |
Build capacity to make and sell Roma ‘products’ | LSG members participating in local governance | More balanced coverage in the press |
Capacity build with Roma create their own Roma LSG ensuring broad representation across Roma groups |
| Find more Roma representatives |
Involving the community through young people |
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Multi-partner ‘graffiti’ project – art project for children and young people |
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Employment as a tool for integration |
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Communications
On the second day, partners participated in a communications workshop. They completed templates to show how they would capitalise on their work locally and contribute to the capitalisation of the work of the partnership.
Partners began by looking at the stakeholders they most wanted to influence both as a city and transnationally: (Bologna representatives had to leave earlier to catch flights)
City name | Local key influencers | Transnational key influencers |
Almeria | Advisers to Mayor NGOs Administrative Coordinators (city/regional) Roma community | Rep of Andalusia in Brussels Spanish members of the European Parliament |
Budapest | National government Political Leaders of Budapest districts and the municipalities | European Parliament European Commission |
Glasgow | GCC Executive Committee Scottish Government Structural Fund Local community | EU citizens EU Policy Makers Urbact |
Nagykallo | Kindergarten teachers Teachers age <10 children ULSG Social media user local population | EU Commission ( DG Regio)
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Torrent | Local government Managing Authority Regional and National Authority Local Committee Diversity Management Secretariado Gitano – NGO Laura Vicuna NGO Nova Vida La Liga LCEE Local Community – Roma and non-Roma | EU Commission DG Regio INTERACT Direct management EU programmes (authorities) Erasmus, Life, Cosme…. |
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Partners agreed to contribute to newsletters and blogs with articles, social media connections, case studies and other tools. They took away templates to complete that would help TE Communications and other partners to promote the work that they are all doing. The templates ensure responsibility for certain aspects of capitalisation of the work partners are undertaking.
Learning outcomes:
This two day meeting gave partners the opportunity to consider where they were up to and how to do more to capitalise on the work they are doing. Partners learned:
- That the LSG needs constant consideration – are the right people involved? If not how do they ensure that the right people remain involved and engaged, the right people at the right time but not everyone all the time either.
- That the LSGs also need support to develop and this needs to be prioritised and properly considered
- That different sections of the community are important to leverage change – small actions at local level working with target groups can be effective
- That good communication needs consideration - of stakeholders, target audiences and message.
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