FCDL News Archive

Neighbourhood identity: People, time and place
Douglas Robertson, James Smyth and Ian McIntosh. March 2008

This new report from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, is a study of how neighbourhood identity is formed and the implications this may have for area renewal policies. The study examines three neighbourhoods in Stirling, Scotland, and explores what it means to people to ‘come from’ each of these areas as a way of understanding issues of belonging and attachment to particular places. The authors:

• consider why regeneration policies often fail in their objectives;
• examine why the reputations of housing estates often display a remarkable longevity and resilience to change;
• focus on how such reputations are established and understood by those in and outside particular areas;
• look at the implications these reputations have for the identities of neighbourhoods and the people who live in them.

The report is available to download free from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation website: www.jrf.org.uk/bookshop/

Improving Reach: Support for Black and minority ethnic and other excluded communities

The Federation, with support from Ubuntu, the national network for Black and minority ethnic community development practitioners, and TWICS (Training for Work in Communities), recently made a successful bid to the Change Up Improving Reach programme.

The aim of this project is to support Black and minority ethnic and other excluded community groups, organisations and networks in identifying their own needs around improving effectiveness as individual groups. We also aim to support the ability of groups to shape and contribute to mainstream planning and decision making.

Find out more about our Improving Reach work here.

If you are a Black and minority ethnic or other excluded group based in the South Yorkshire, North West or South West regions of England and would like to talk to our Training Development Worker, Susi Miller, about this project, please email susi@fcdl.org.uk or contact FCDL.

If you are a BME group based in the South East Region and would like to know more about this initiative, please contact Ranthir at TWICS: 284 Burgess Road, Swaythling, Southampton SO16 3BE. Tel: 023 8067 1111 or email info@twics.org.uk.
Read more about the work in South East in two leaflets produced by TWICS: download flyer 1 and flyer 2.

Community Development Challenge - report launched.
The Community Development Challenge is a report produced by a coalition of the Federation for Community Development Learning, Community Development Foundation (CDF), Community Development Exchange (CDX), and the CD2 working group, published by Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG). The report, launched in December 2006, states that many of the current reforms in public services which are seeking to engage communities are unlikely to achieve their objectives without community development, and that without community development:

• the most disadvantaged people receive poor quality public services yet are least confident and skilled at representing their needs to authorities;
• sections of the local population are not able to participate in activities that are intended for the whole community because prejudices, assumptions and cultural differences are not tackled;
• public agencies and departments that need to engage with local communities are unaware of each other’s efforts, lack insight into how communities work and have few channels for dialogue with them.

The full report and summary can be downloaded here. Hard copies of the full report are available at a cost of £15.00 from CDF: please email publications@cdf.org.uk to order one.

Refugee Integration and Cohesive Communities: Community Development in Practice
Report published by the Community Development Foundation (CDF) into community development work with refugees and asylum seekers. This report presents the findings of a research project exploring how community development values and methods can assist in the integration of asylum seekers and refugees and in promoting cohesive communities. The research explores the practice of a range of practitioners working at both strategic and operational levels on refugee integration and community cohesion.
CDF have produced a four-page summary of the work, which includes recommendations for future work for practitioners, service providers and policy makers. Both the full report and the summary are available on the CDF website, www.cdf.org.uk.

Employers Guide to Training Providers
Learning and Skills Council (LSC) 2005. An 'Employers Guide to Training Providers', an online tool that advises employers on choosing a training provider and allows them to search for providers in a particular field of training. To find out more about this guide and to search the database of providers, or register on the database, see the LSC website at: www.lsc.gov.uk/National/Employer/goodtraining.html

Extending the NOCN programme for Community Development
Review of the National Open College Network (NOCN) Community Development Qualification: click here to download a matrix of the current units in the NOCN community development programme.
The Federation identified the following areas as future unit themes as part of our development work:
1. Black Perspectives in Community Development
2. Work with Refugees and Asylum Seekers
3. Rural Community Development Work
4. Disabled People's perspectives in Community Development

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