Rochdale Community Champions Building Community Knowledge, Developing Community Research in 2015

I4P Rochdale Community Champions Building Community Knowledge, Developing Community Research

Rochdale Community Champions Building Community Knowledge, Developing Community Research Edited by Katy Goldstraw, Helen Chicot and John Diamond

Contents

05 Foreword, Steve Rumbelow

06 Who Are Rochdale Community Champions?

07 The Leadership and Participatory Research Methods Training

08 Rochdale Community Champions: Adult and Continuing Education in action

09 Participatory Research: Principles and Practice

11 The Research: Case Studies 12 1. Yasmin and Andrew 29 2. Chris 32 3. Jan 39 4. Julia 45 5. Norma

45 The Research Process

48 Afterword, John Cater

49 Appendix One: Proposal from Edge Hill University to work with Rochdale Community Champions

51 Appendix Two - Four: Session Planners

53 Appendix Five: Who is Who and How to find out more

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Foreword to the Project Steve Rumbelow, Chief Executive, Rochdale Borough Council.

This is the second booklet to come from the joint work between Edge Hill University and the Rochdale Borough Community Champions. It is an illustration of the deep thinking and hard work that our Community Champions put into their role; not just through the help they give to others as volunteers but also through the careful thought and care that sits behind that. This booklet provides us with some examples of what it means to be a Community Champion. It tells us that who you are and what you think and believe is an important element of what you do.

Public services are facing very challenging times and are having to find new and better delivery models, which work to support confident and resilient communities. Volunteering can play a major part in sustainable public service models and our Community Champions Scheme is an example demonstrating the benefits that skilled and motivated volunteers can bring.

The outcomes from Community Champions are remarkable; they make a positive difference to people’s lives, whether it’s helping an adult to be able to read and write or supporting someone who’s overwhelmed by their financial circumstances. They give their time and expertise to support people in a unique way. Community Champions are a real asset to our borough and something to be proud of. It’s incredible that there are so many Champions, across the borough, helping people – that’s a real force for positive change happening every day .

Something that is very special and important about the Community Champions is the deep level of engagement these volunteers have with the Borough. You’re not just helping people; you’re thinking about, discussing, reflecting and analysing what’s going on, identifying what is helpful and unhelpful, what is important and what needs to change. It’s vital that this thinking and engagement drives the leadership of the Community Champions - and it’s only through work like this partnership with Edge Hill University that we can really understand your views, listen to and act on them.

I understand that the emphasis of the research, this year has been about understanding why rather than how things work the way they do for Community Champions. This research will tell us about what it means to you to be a Community Champion, their r perspective on our community and about why the way things are done is as important as what gets done when you’re helping people.

This insight is important, not just for the Community Champions but also to inform the development and delivery of wider front line public services.

Thank you.

Steve Rumblelow Chief Executive, Rochdale Borough Council

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Who are Rochdale Community Champions? The Leadership & Participatory Research Methods Training.

Rochdale Borough Council hosts the Community Champions. The champions are volunteers Rochdale Borough Council has developed a training support programme with the Community who are chosen for their passion, commitment and human focus. The Rochdale Community Champions based on a competency approach. All volunteers are inducted into the Champions offer an innovative and supportive approach to supporting others in their community volunteer project and offered continuing professional development training community. Rochdale Council describes the champions as: throughout the course of their volunteering. Recognising the positivity, passion and compassion of the Champion volunteer team and seeking to develop this, Rochdale “Rochdale Borough’s Community Champions are residents who have excellent people” Borough Council sought out ‘Leadership and Decision Making’ and ‘Undertaking Locally skills; they care about their local area and have a high level of expertise that is based on Based Research’ training from Edge Hill University. This training was based on the positive their life experience. They use their skills and attributes to help others in their community. solution focussed ethos of the Community Champions. This is the second year that the Community Champions: training programme has been delivered. - help people at a time when they need some support - work with people to identify and clarify their goals; the person can work on any goals The training was delivered over four days in January 2015. The first session was focused around models of leadership and decision making. The sessions were very much workshop But the emphasis chosen is most often on wellbeing, skills, employment or family matters focussed and activity centred, encouraging the Champions to share experiences and - are trained and expert in using methods which help people to progress towards and expertise. Post it Walls were created, discussions were led about decisions makers, achieve their goals authority and power. Issues were discussed around working with conflict and conflict resolution workshop techniques were role played. Decision Making Trees were talked Although they are able to offer support at any stage, Community Champions aim to offer through, then workshopped by the Community Champions and factors that shape the trees most of their support at the “single contact” stage, supporting the person to build their and enable it to grow were discussed and developed. capacity and resilience; if possible preventing a progression towards a need for further services” The second, third and fourth sessions were focussed on developing participatory research www.rochdale.gov.uk skills. These sessions were focussed on undertaking locally based research. Why we might undertake locally based research was initially discussed, followed by discussions of what Rochdale Community Champion volunteers offer support and is evidence and how research can be co-produced. Toolkits were then shared with the training for others in their community in a wide variety of areas Community Champions, using the Association for Research with the Voluntary and from literacy, families, health and wellbeing, and employment Community Sector (www.arvac.org.uk ) resources. Planning a locally based research topic, skills. The support that the Champions offer is solution framing research questions and gathering research were then discussed. Day two focussed and of a positive nature. The support is bespoke to commenced with a discussion of ethics and ethical practice, followed by the pragmatics of each individual, but is focused around a six session model, with a research project. Rochdale Community Champions worked in self-formed groups to share the aim of signposting the client after the initial support period. ideas and create a plan for their locally based research project. During this process an animation was created with the group about what being a champion means to them. Day As part of the support that Rochdale Borough offer, the champions receive a range of three was focussed on developing research skills and ideas. Day four reviewed and development training. The Community Champions find this training useful and attendance refocused learning and supported participants to consider their research plans. is good at the sessions. The development needs of the volunteers are very much valued. For some volunteers, their focus is on a particular task for example literacy support, for The training offered by Edge Hill University, was offered to all of Rochdale Community others volunteering is part of a more general process of development enabling them to grow Champions volunteer team, with the recognition that not all of the team would wish to in a supportive environment. Rochdale Community Champions staff support team, has develop a leadership or research role within their volunteer remit. The aim of the training worked hard to support the training needs of each volunteer, recognising the diversity of was to empower and enable the volunteers, providing them with an opportunity to develop volunteer motivations. their leadership and research skills should they wish to. The feedback from the training was very positive, Rochdale Community Champions liked the training style, the participatory nature of the sessions and the approach to learning that Edge Hill University offered. Some Rochdale Community champions then chose to utilise this training by undertaking locally based research. A volunteer led, community participatory research project was born, supported by Rochdale Borough Council Champions team and Edge Hill staff.

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Rochdale Community Champions: Adult and Continuing Education in Action. Participatory Research: Rochdale Community Champions are a community led, volunteering project. The ideals of What is it, why is it useful for the Rochdale Community Champions locating community education and adult learning in a community setting, led by the community, for the community are very much the key tenets of the Champion Ethos. The After completing the four days of Leadership and Decision Making and Undertaking Locally Continuing education and Adult learning offered by the Rochdale Champion’s is very much based research training in January 2015. Volunteers were offered the opportunity to engage of the ethos espoused by the The National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) in a participatory research project supported by the Champion Support team at the Borough www.niace.org.uk which aims to encourage all adults to engage in learning of all kinds. Council and staff at Edge Hill University. Participatory action research (PAR) holds to an epistemology of power that questions the nature of knowledge and the extent to which Rochdale Community champions are focused on the specific learning needs of the adults knowledge can serve the interests of societies powerful, reinforcing societal hierarchies, PAR; with whom they work. Community Champions offer group learning sessions, such as job clubs, supporting adults who are unemployed with CV building and computer skills. Learning “Seeks to understand and improve the world by changing it. At its heart is collective, self- here is offered in a variety of Community Centres across Rochdale. Community Champions reflective inquiry that researchers and participants undertake, so that they can understand also offer one to one support, in areas such as adult literacy. These one to one sessions, and improve upon the practices in which they participate and the situations in which they are often in less formal community settings such a local café. Learning is brought to the find themselves. The reflective process is directly linked into action, influenced by learners by members of their own community, in settings that learners are familiar with and understanding of history, culture and local context and embedded in social relationships” feel comfortable in. Most Community Champions do not have formal teaching qualifications, Baum, MacDougall & Smith 2006:854 they do however, alongside training offered by the Rochdale Community Champions team, have excellent inter-personal skills, being very well skilled in reacting to and developing the For this reason Edge Hill University worked with Rochdale learning needs of their community. Community Champions using participatory research techniques. The hope was that through the research process, volunteers would learn and develop, that the process of research would build volunteer confidence and leadership.

Participatory research is distinctive in that it holds the social justice goal – to enable action. Action is arrived at through participation in a reflective cycle, research participants collect data, analyse their data and then decide on appropriate action. This focus on leadership, decision making and research action fits into the training sessions delivered by Edge Hill University for Rochdale Community Champions.

Participatory research has a social justice function in that it pays particular attention to power and the hierarchy that exists between researcher and research participant. The primary focus of participatory research is that it is a collaborative process between researcher and participants. Participatory research also holds the social justice function that the research is not extractive; the research is a collaborative process that involves research participants within the research process. The focus of participatory research on the shared co-production of knowledge fits into the training sessions delivered by Edge Hill University with Rochdale Community Champions.

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What happened next: Support sessions with Edge Hill Staff The Research – Case Studies

After the training sessions in January 2015, Rochdale Community Champions were Rochdale Community Champions commenced their research in March 2015. Here is a small encouraged to develop their own locally based research project. Rochdale Community sample of the work that was produced. What is included below is by no means all of the Champions chose to conduct individual research projects. The research conducted was a research that was produced and is merely intended to provide the reader with a feel for the real mix of projects that reflected the diversity of volunteer interests and skills. Some of the quality and thought that the research project initiated in the Rochdale Community initial research that had begun in the January 2015 training, changed and re-formed, some Champions. volunteers experienced illness and had to step down from the research role. Volunteers were often surprised by the effect that the research had on them, the reality of communities You can access the Animation that was created as part of the 2015 project here: and their experiences of Work Programme Sanctions and poverty was very emotionally www.edgehill.ac.uk/i4p demanding. You can access the radio play that was created as part of the 2015 project here: Edge Hill staff met with the volunteers in Rochdale approximately every six weeks to support www.edgehill.ac.uk/i4p the volunteers with their locally based research. Support was also offered via Rochdale Borough Campion’s Support Team and e mail support was provided in the intervening times by Edge Hill Staff. The visits by Edge Hill staff were set up as ‘advice slots,’ Champions arranged appointments to discuss their research with Edge Hill staff and advice was shared regarding issues such as ethics, research questionnaires and qualitative research methods. There was also a lunch seminar within these visit days. The lunch seminar led on topics such as research techniques, research ethics and reflective learning.

At the advice session in July, volunteers had gathered a great amount of material and evidence from their various research groups and it was decided that alongside a celebration event, that this booklet would be created to share some of the research process and findings. A similar booklet was created for the July 2014 celebration event and this year this booklet sits alongside an animation and radio play as evidence of the hard work, commitment and passion of the Champions for community research.

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Research Case Study: Yasmin and Andrew Yasmin - Talking Heads

Andrew In the recording Studio Andrew is a dedicated Rochdale Community Champion. He in the process of conducting a – recording Yasmin & Andrew’s work longer term research project. The project is a piece of social history research linking themes from the Workhouses of the 1930s to the policy narratives of the present day. Andrew is a “TALKING HEADS” passionate researcher and has dedicated many hours to reading a range of novels such as ‘the road to Wigan pier’ which offer a background to his current research. He is currently Yasmin conducting semi structured interviews with Rochdale residents focusing on memories of the Rochdale area, benefits and welfare provision. 31.VIII.2015

Yasmin Yasmin is a passionate and talented script writer and has drawn on these talents in her research for Rochdale Community Champions. Yasmin has developed characters that September 2015 reflect the experience of many Rochdale residents in receipt of benefit. Chantelle; Yasmin’s Snapshot of Community based Research for Rochdale Community Champions primary character is a caring and supportive sibling for her autistic brother. Chantelle is & Edge Hill University placed on the Work Programme and in failing to comply with her workfare requirements due to her caring responsibilities, she is ‘sanctioned’, her benefits are removed and she is SCENE II : forced into a position where she has to access a foodbank. Yasmin’s script, through the medium of ethno-drama (Mienczakawski 2013) tells the real story behind the Work Chantelles story : A Rochdale childhood Programme headlines, using theatre as a means to give voice to those who so often are Hi, My names Chantelle. That’s not my real name I was called Edna , after my Grandma - silenced. To listen to Yasmin and Andrew’s radio play please visit; www.edgehill.ac.uk/I4P how gross is that?!

I live with my Mum and step-brother in a small flat in Rochdale. It was my job from as far back as I can remember to look after us all, especially my young brother Ben – who's a bit “slow”.

Mum was usually gauched out on the settee and I'd desperately be trying to stop Ben from crying because he was hungry but I knew that there was nothing in the house to eat because Mum had cashed in the Family Allowance yesterday.

I didn't get to school much as I was caring for Mum & Ben unless she'd managed to get a few nights work at the Packing Factory, [1].

Then I'd have to try and grab some money off her before she spent it all on drink or drugs.

We didn't have many clothes and when Gran tried to invite us to her church, I had to say we weren’t well because we just didn't have any smart clothes kept for “ Sunday Best “ to wear ; just hand -me- downs from “Aunty” Brenda's kids next door.

We existed on beans & sausages on white bread and biscuits. School holidays were the worst times, then we didn't get our Free School Meals and I'd often go hungry so that Ben could have whatever was left in the cupboard, [2].

I know that Mum loved us , in her own way, and that she tried her best for us, but if it hadn't been for Gran bringing us “food-parcels” from her church and “ Aunty “ Brenda , me & Ben wouldn't have survived, [3].

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SCENE II : SCENE III :

Job Center Plus Office Food Bank

MADGE : Chantelle! Chantelle! MILDRED : Hello, Please come in and take a seat . Would you like a cup of tea or coffee? CHANTELLE : Here ! I'm here! You look a little flustered my dear .

MADGE : Yes take a seat. Now let me have a look at your details. CHANTELLE : No ...I've run all the way here. I just need to get my breath back Oh dear! That’s most unfortunate. and I'll be alright. [she hands the voucher over to Mildred], [1]. CHANTELLE : What is there something wrong? MILDRED : Thank you. MADGE : Yes. You failed to appear at the placement we set up for you at the Don't worry dear we'll get you sorted out. Peoples Advisory Pop-In .Therefore you have been sanctioned for six weeks, [1]. CHANTELLE : [Tearfully] I'm grateful...but to be honest I'd NEVER thought I'd get this low! CHANTELLE : Oh God! I can't believe this! I did phone up and tell them I couldn't make it ,honest I did! MILDRED : Shall we say a prayer together My dear?

It's just that Ben was playing up, Mum wasn't well and I just didn't have CHANTELLE : [Doubtfully] Well if YOU want to…? the bus fare to get there. It’s two buses to get right over the other side of town you see, I couldn’t leave Ben with Mum and he couldn't walk there MILDRED : Dear Lord . Please bless this child of yours and please help her to with me it's miles and he's just a little kid... your wondrous bounty. Amen, [2].

MADGE : I don't want to hear it .When will people like you realise that there are CHANTELLE : Amen. [A Food bank helper comes across bustling with three carrier bags always consequences to your actions? ,[2]. of food]

CHANTELLE : But what am I going to do with no money coming in? MILDRED : Here we are my dear .Here is three bags, enough for three people I feel sick! [3]. for three days, [3]. Would you like to help yourself to two tins from the out-of-date box? How am I going to manage? [4]. CHANTELLE : Yes please! Can I take these two tins of beans and sausages? Our Ben MADGE : Well I can give you a voucher for the Food bank I suppose . really likes these… [and three bags of tinned food won't get far with no tokens in the meter and us already on emergency credit ...she says under Yes , here it is .If you hurry they might still be open now. her breath].

CHANTELLE : Thanks Madge ! Oh, God , I really don't want to go there MILDRED : Yes , of course you can my dear . And why don't you take this Little Book - but I've got no choice now have I?, [5]. of Bible Readings as well – there’s one for each day – you CAN read can't you ?

CHANTELLE : Of course I can -I'm NOT stupid you know! Sorry...You've been really kind and I'd like to say thank you to you all for your kindness even though I don't feel very deserving of it .

MILDRED : You are a child of God. He will bless you and keep you always.

CHANTELLE : I hope so, 'cos I've got another six weeks of survival to manage first! Bye now. [4], [5], [6].

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SCENE IV : Andrew's supplementary notes to accompany Yasmin's “Talking Heads “ scenarios :

Reality hits home APPENDIX : SCENE I CHANTELLE: Hi, Chantelle here again. Chantelles story : A Rochdale childhood

I wanted to tell you about how awful I was feeling after getting sanctioned for six weeks, [1]. 1]. Adzuna recently ranked Rochdale as being amongst the fourth worst places in the UK for job competition , with an average of 11 people chasing every job, I felt so angry, yet helpless to do anything about it. Nobody told me about the hardship payment I was entitled to .I didn't have anyone to turn to, being sanctioned was the new [2]. In Summer 2015 Rochdale Food bank experienced a spike in demand for Food Bank leprosy, and secretly I felt ashamed for missing that appointment and giving the DWP the parcels from parents struggling to feed their children during the long summer holiday when excuse they needed. their children could not access their school dinners during the holidays. For many local children this was their main or their only cooked meal of the day. Returning home with the carrier bags from the food bank I put it away in the cupboard, and tried to work out in my head what meals I could cook with it . http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/struggling- Mum was on the settee as usual , cigarette in one hand watching telly, and Ben was in his parents-skipping-meals-children-9672820 room looking at his toy cards. I felt a wave of total despair hit me. I could just see my life never getting any better , just struggling on, and on. The report, which has been delivA Greater Manchester community club will provide food for kids from low-income families this summer after a survey revealed that a squeeze on I tried to get an appointment at the Doctors, but they only had an appointment four weeks budgets in the school holidays is forcing parents to skip meals. away, all the earlier appointments had been booked up by people on line, who had computers of their own. Almost a third of parents on lower incomes have skipped a meal so that their children could eat during the holidays, accered to all 650 MPs, reveals that 62 per cent of parents with a How could we afford to have the internet at home when we struggled to pay the telly licence fee? household income of less than £25,000 aren’t always able to afford to buy food outside of term time. I'd always suffered with anxiety, right from being little, 'cos I was worried about Ben most of the time .Mum said: “I could worry for England !”. Yes, I could get the Gold Medal alright. For parents with incomes of less than £15,000, the figure was 73pc. Fear gripped me in it's icy vice, what else could go wrong? And 41pc of parents in low-income families had skipped meals during the holidays. School holidays are especially difficult for hard-up families, whose children usually receive Troubles always come in threes don't they? free school meals or support from breakfast clubs. Superstitiously, I'd always saluted Magpies, if I say them, and I tried not to track on cracks in the pavement just to ward of the bad luck. [3]. Child poverty figures for Central Rochdale ward Church Urban Fund : Poverty Look up tool online at link: Even when something good happened, like “Aunty” Brenda coming round and bringing us some food or clothes, I always looked over my shoulder, waiting for something awful to https://www.cuf.org.uk/poverty-england/poverty-look-tool happen , to balance it out .

I found myself going down the spiral of despair fast this time.

Not sleeping, not eating, [Ben could always use my share of the food ], and feeling apathetic. All the fight had gone out of me.

Somehow I managed to drag myself out of the door and get to the free phone in the library to talk to the woman in the CAB. Overloaded with work as she was, all she could advise me was that she could only give me a voucher for the foodbank, [2].

So I thanked her and hung up in tears.

At the desk was a card advertising the Samaritans, I picked it up because I felt I was just despairing enough to ring them.

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APPENDIX : SCENE II Job Centre Plus Office [4]. The Trussell Trust run more 400 food banks nationwide, to find your nearest Food bank visit www.trusselltrust.org/map or to donate to the charity visit www.trusselltrust.org/donate [1]. The latest figures made available to the Public are for the period 22 October 2012 until 31 December 2013. A Food bank food parcel for three days consists of approximately £14.30 per person .

These show 4,078 people had sanctions imposed during this time at Rochdale. Job Centre, 53% of TT Trussell Trust foodbank users have been referred because of delays or changes Fleece Street , 40 % of these people were sanctioned without being told why the sanction to their benefits. was imposed by DWP staff. “No ID, no checks... and vouchers for sob stories: The truth behind those shock food Heywood,Job Centre ,Taylor Street - 972 , bank claims”, Mail on Sunday , 19 April 2014, Oldham Job Centre ,Tweedale House - 6,605 - See more at link : Rochdale Job Centre , Fleece Street - 4,078 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2608606/No-ID-no-checks-vouchers-sob-stories- Middleton Job Centre - 1,483 The-truth-shock-food-bank-claims.html#ixzz2zcNWbK00 In the Greater Manchester Area , the Manchester East & West area had 24,072 'adverse' sanctions. [5]. Open Letter from 27 Anglican Bishops and Catholic, United Reformed and Methodist leaders, and Quakers, published [20 February 2014] called for immediate action on welfare, Of these the majority by far were in the 18-24 year age group in total 246,592 individuals. wages and food markets, three of the biggest contributors to the hunger crisis. The original With 91,603 in the 25-29 year age group. text to this letter can be read at :

Most worryingly of all across the whole of the UK there were 49,827 disabled people ,who http://www.quaker.org.uk/news/quakers-say-end-hunger-fast were sanctioned by the DWP. and at : The latest DWP statistics for sanctioned claimants in our Rochdale can be found at : https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/jobseekers-allowance-and-employment-and- http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/27-bishops-slam-david-camerons-3164033 support-allowance-sanctions-decisions-made-to-december-2013

[2]. A “Culture of Contempt” “Time To Rethink benefit Sanctions” , [March 2015 ]. Church Action on Poverty, The Over the Easter weekend 2014progressive Christian think tank Ekklesia reported : Baptist Union of Great Britain, the United Reform church, the Methodist Church, the Church of Scotland and the Church in Wales. “We're surrounded by too many Christian leaders who are using their authority to advance self-serving and mean-spirited agendas that crucify those who are already http://www.church-poverty.org.uk/news/pressroom/resources/reports poor and marginalised. If we're serious about following Jesus, we need to start turning over some tables ourselves.” and see also link at : [- See more at link : http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/20435 ], They concluded that : http://www.methodist.org.uk/news-and-events/news-releases/new-data-more-than-100- people-per-day-with-mental-health-problems-are-having-their-benefits-sanctioned “There is something seriously amiss here. As the Prime Minister sings the praises of Christian values, his government and sections of the media appear to have declared From April 2015 the first trails of conditionality for WORKING PEOPLE needing support of a war not just on the needy, but on the kindness and compassion of people who the benefits system will begin. This will include working people who are working but earning attempt to help those in need. Where will it end?” below a threshold income normally set at 11,300- who will become subject to DWP conditionality or sanctions. The Resolution Foundation estimate that this will bring an additional 1,200,000 people under the sanctions regime.

[3]. http://www.channel4.com/news/malnutrition-health-emergency-dwp-british-medical- journal

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APPENDIX : SCENE IV Whilst over the same Easter Weekend the Archbishop of Canterbury spoke in The Telegraph Reality Hits Home of the need for a Better support structure for the poor , [- See more at link: http:// www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/10773517/Archbishop-of-Canterbury-Justin-Welby-we- [1].Local Mental Health Campaign Group launch campaign highlighting “100 people a day need-a-better-support-structure-for-the-poor.html], adding in his Easter address that: with mental health issues nationally having their benefits sanctioned” please see links at:

“In this country, even as the economy improves there is weeping in broken families, http://www.rbuf.org.uk/news/61/20/Newly-Relaunched-RBUF-Campaigns-Group- in people ashamed to seek help from food banks, or frightened by debt.” Publishes-Open-Letter-On-Benefit-Sanctions/d,Detail [ - See more at link: http://www.archbishopofcanterbury.org/articles.php/5303/the-one- who-was-dead-is-now-alive.-where-there-was-weeping-there-is-now-joy-archbishop-justin and : s-easte#sthash.QEObrsiW.dpuf http://www.welfareweekly.com/letters-politicians-urged-to-help-safeguard-benefit- [6]. There is growing anecdotal evidence that people receiving Food Bank supplies are claimants-with-mental-illness/ unable , especially those on electric voucher meters, and by definition facing a dire financial crisis ,to cook tinned food at home when they have no access to cooking facilities. This it and also : could be argued allows people to subsist in Summer but is problematic in the depths of winter. http://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/97504/one-hundred- people-a-day-with-mental-health-problems-are-having-their-welfare-benefits-sanctioned

APPENDIX : SCENE III [2].For the first time it has been confirmed that Housing Benefit will be subject to sanctions. Food Bank The DWP legal framework would allow workers to be instructed to change jobs, attend mandatory training, or increase hours in order to earn more than the initial threshold income. [1]. “Demand was driven so high that on average the food banks in Greater Manchester If you fail to comply your Housing Benefit will be sanctioned or cut. were used once every 14 minutes” , - “Demand for food banks rockets by up to 90 PER CENT in Greater Manchester” Amy Glendinning , Rochdale Observer , 16 April 2014 . “Sanctioning someone with a mental health problem for being late for a meeting is like sanctioning someone with a broken leg for limping. The fact that this system See more at link: http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester- punishes people for the symptoms of their illness is a clear and worrying sign that it news/food-banks-rochdale-salford-tameside-6992502 is fundamentally flawed.”

[2]. “Quando dou comida aos pobres chamam-me de santo. Quando pergunto por que “Churches have increasingly seen people in desperate need because they have been eles são pobres chamam-me de comunista.” / “When I give food to the poor, they sanctioned. The suffering and injustice we have seen caused by the sanctions system call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist.” deserves serious scrutiny.” – Don Helder Camara: Essential Writings – Time to Rethink Benefit Sanctions , [March 2015].

[3] “Food Poverty” has become a current local issue as reported by the Observer on 16 April 2014 ,which stated that: “Food banks around the region have seen a huge increase “The question always is, has everything been done to make the sufferings of these in people needing hand-outs - up NINETY per cent in some areas” . exceptions as small as possible? Or , in the triumph of the crowded procession, have the helpless been trampled on, instead of being gently lifted aside out of the roadway Nearly 39,000 people relied on food banks across Greater Manchester last year - with the of the conqueror, whom they have no power to accompany on his march?” biggest increases seen in Salford, Rochdale,Tameside and Trafford. North and South | Elizabeth Gaskell 1855

“Demand for food banks rockets by up to 90 PER CENT in Greater Manchester” Amy Glendinning , Rochdale Observer , 16 April 2014 .

See more at link: http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester- news/food-banks-rochdale-salford-tameside-6992502

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Yasmin and Andrew worked together to create this piece of research; The Traditional English Folk song Poverty Knock is a factory-workers' song, written to be sung over the rhythm of the flying shuttles and clankings of mill machinery. Conditions of "Poverty Knock" - Embers from the fire” the cloth mills of the 1890's, when this song was written, were hot, noisy, and dangerous. Injury and even death from the awkward and unsafe weaving machines was commonplace. Yasmin Kenyon & Andrew Wastling And yet the continual knocking of the shuttle was at least a surety that you'd be able to eat in a time when unemployment still meant virtual starvation and misery. A piece of Community Research conducted in conjunction with Edge Hill University and Rochdale Community Champions This theme of unemployment meaning virtual starvation and misery for common people is January – September 2015 embedded throughout the course of English history. We find its narrative echoing down through the centuries in the words of radical English Preacher, John Ball. He would preach Verse I – Cast off the Yoke of Bondage in the market place on a Sunday as people were leaving church his ideas raised the imagination of the peasant masses beyond the harshness of their daily lives, fusing their [Chorus] anger with a utopian vision, creating a revolutionary consciousness, one that was about to 'Poverty, poverty knock,' my loom is a saying all day burst into life. John Ball's famous Sermon at Blackheath , quoted in General Chronicle of Poverty, poverty knock, gaffer's too skinny to pay England 1381 , still makes powerful reading today ; Poverty, poverty knock, keeping one eye on the clock I know I can guttle when I hear my shuttle go, 'poverty, poverty knock' In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out Up every morning at five, I wonder that we keep alive of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. Tired and yawning another cold morning It's back to the dreary old drive. My good friends, things cannot go on well in England , nor ever will until everything [Repeat chorus] shall be in common, when there shall be neither vassal nor lord, and all distinctions Oh dear we're going to be late levelled; when the lords shall be no more masters than ourselves. How ill they have Gaffer is stood at the gate used us! They have wines, spices and fine bread, when we have only rye and the refuse We're out of pocket, our wages they'll docket of fine straw; and if we drink, it must be water. ・ [1]. We'll have to buy grub on the slate [Repeat chorus] Little wonder then that John Ball was described as “The Mad Priest of Kent” by his And when our wages they bring, we're often short of a string enemies though to the peasants, he quickly became, according to folk-lore and the While we are fighting with gaffer for snatching chroniclers of the period, one of the revolt’s leaders. He was certainly one of the most We know to his brass he will cling eloquent representatives of the Peasants Revolt and one of the first recorded leaders of [Repeat chorus] popular revolt in English history. Sometimes a shuttle flies out and gives some poor woman a clout Wretched is the infant's lot There she lies bleeding but nobody's heeding Born within a straw- roofed cot; Oh who's going to carry her out? Be he generous, wise or brave, [Repeat chorus] He must only be a slave. Oh dear, my poor head it sings I should have woven three strings Long, long labour, little rest, My threads are breaking and my back is aching Still to toil to be oppressed: Oh dear, I wish I had wings Drained by taxes of his store, Poverty, poverty knock Punished next for being poor: Poverty, poverty knock Poverty, poverty knock This is the poor wretch's lot, Born within the straw-roofed cot [2] MUSIC : CHUMBAWAMBA performs “ Poverty Knock “

You-tube video with Lyrics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfwJ387cs00 from the album "English Rebel Songs 1381-1984" (2003)

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Peasants Revolt in itself is something of a misnomer in fact these were highly skilled Dom Hélder Câmara like John Ball exposed one of the great fissures in the established craftsmen with working skills often passed down from father to son for generations. It's church, bringing into sharp relief the claim of the church to be on the side of the poor. easy to forget in the age of zero-hours contracts and casual factory work for many in It should come as no surprise that the Medieval Church authorities resisted the translation Rochdale today that these people had highly specialist skills and training. How many of us of the Bible to English. Religious reformers such as St. Francis of Assisi and John Wycliffe today for example are skilled enough to grow enough food to harvest for a family and have of the Peasants Revolt fame were able to understand the Latin Vulgate spoke out against a surplus to barter or trade to others, or have the skills to forge iron into plough shares of the rich and powerful. “The sharing of goods was always treated by some Christians, cast tools , let alone intricately carve roughly hewn blocks of stone into the face of an angel even if only a minority of them, as a virtue” [6]. or cherub for the outside of a monastery or church ? The New Testament also laid great emphasis on the universal sharing of material goods. Christ's Sermon on the Mount eulogised the poor and the oppressed: It was, as Dan Jones pointed out: “When he learned that the crowd had only five loaves and two fishes among them, “Sparked by a series of three poll taxes, each more recklessly imposed then the last Christ divided them equally, and a miracle was witnessed as everyone present had , and all played out against a background of oppressive labour laws that had been enough to eat. This was one of the great influences on subsequent endeavours for all imposed to keep the rich rich and the poor poor “ [3] people to have an adequate means of subsistence” [7]

The appeal of this is obvious in an age when life was “ brutish and short “ for many , the Committed Socialist William Morris ,who also designed the notable stained glass window – poor barely had enough to eat, certainly not a healthy balanced diet, even when times were the Burne-Jones window in of St. Chads , Rochdale - depicting Faith, Hope and Charity, good such as at Martinmass and Christmas when as a popular rhyme chimed: wrote in his prose poem “ A Dream of John Ball” that : “November : At Martinmass I kill my swine “Above the heads of the crowd, and now slowly working towards the cross, was a December ; And at Christmas I drink red wine” [8] banner on a high–raised cross–pole, a picture of a man and woman half–clad in skins of beasts seen against a background of green trees, the man holding a spade and the Later Tyndale translated the New Testament from Greek into English. His version is printed at woman a distaff and spindle rudely done enough, but yet with a certain spirit and much Worms in 1526 in 3000 copies. When they reach England, the bishop of London fearing that; meaning; and underneath this symbol of the early world and man’s first contest with nature were the written words: “the jewel of the church is turned into the common sport of the people” seizes every When Adam delved and Eve span copy that his agents can lay their hands on. Who was then the gentleman? The banner came on and through the crowd, which at last opened where we stood The offending texts are burnt at St Paul's Cross, a gathering place in the precincts of the for its passage, and the banner–bearer turned and faced the throng and stood on the cathedral. So effective are the bishop's methods that today only two copies of the original first step of the cross beside me.” [4]. 3000 survive. For his efforts Tyndale is branded a heretic and executed at the stake in 1536.

It should be remembered that John Ball was preaching at a time when: “The church was Then as now the Bible text was all things to all men – a tool of oppression for the wealthy - the largest slave owner in the early Middle Ages. Four abbeys ruled by Alucin of York or a dangerous instrument of liberation and freedom for the poor. employed 20,000 slaves ...In England it was heretics, from John Ball & the Lollards onwards, who recalled that there were no gentry in the Garden of Eden” [5]. "When Adam delved and Eve span, Who was then the gentleman? From the beginning all men by nature were created alike, and our bondage or servitude came in by the This was orthodox Liberation Theology a clear six hundred years before the “Bishop of the unjust oppression of naughty men. For if God would have had any bondmen from the Slums” , Brazilian archbishop Dom Hélder Câmara. Who's famous adage "When I give food beginning, he would have appointed who should be bond, and who free. And therefore to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why they are poor, they call me a I exhort you to consider that now the time is come, appointed to us by God, in which communist.” in the 1980s went right to the very heart of the churches response to the ye may (if ye will) cast off the yoke of bondage, and recover liberty." Christian ministry to the poor and dispossessed . “In what way are those whom we call lords greater masters than ourselves? How have they deserved it? Why do they hold us in bondage? If we all spring from a single father and mother, Adam and Eve, how can they claim or prove that they are lords more than us, except by making us produce and grow wealth which they spend? [9].

MUSIC : Sound of church bells from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OLHDDAu37Y

24 25 Rochdale Community Champions Building Community Knowledge, Developing Community Research

“He went slowly up the steps of the cross and stood at the top with one hand laid on We also hear similar themes of a “ Great Levelling” in the words of writer William Langland the shaft, and shout upon shout broke forth from the throng. When the shouting died in a series of dream visions dealing with the social and spiritual predicament of late 14th- away into a silence of the human voices, the bells were still quietly chiming with that century England . Langland was no stranger to wandering England and Wales himself selling far–away voice of theirs, and the long–winged dusky swifts, by no means scared by masses and copying text as he went along. But it his own words mainly in which his voice the concourse, swung round about the cross with their wild squeals; and the man comes down to us through history; stood still for a little, eyeing the throng, or rather looking first at one and then another man in it, as though he were trying to think what such an one was thinking of, or what “And I have a dream a marvellous dream. I saw a fair field full of folk, poor and rich, working he were fit for. and wandering as the world demands...in particular the ploughmen who labour and till the ground for the good of the whole community “ Sometimes he caught the eye of one or other, and then that kindly smile spread over his face, but faded off it into the sternness and sadness of a man who has heavy and William Langland, Piers Ploughman, 1372-89 great thoughts hanging about him. But when John Ball first mounted the steps of the cross a lad at some one’s bidding had run off to stop the ringers, and so presently the MUSIC : The Melrose Quartet performs "Sing John Ball" - You-tube Video with lyrics. voice of the bells fell dead, leaving on men’s minds that sense of blankness or even https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eWu1gMVSN8 disappointment which is always caused by the sudden stopping of a sound one has got used to and found pleasant. Bibliography: Verse I – Cast off the Yoke of Bondage [1]. Writings on the Wall: A Radical and Socialist Anthology, 1215-1984 , Edited Tony Benn, But a great expectation had fallen by now on all that throng, and no word was spoken Faber and Faber (October 1984), even in a whisper, and all men’s hearts and eyes were fixed upon the dark figure [2]. Five Romantic Plays 1768-1821 (Oxford World's Classics) Paperback – 6 Jan 2000 standing straight up now by the tall white shaft of the cross, his hands stretched out by Paul Baines (Editor), Edward Burns (Editor) before him, one palm laid upon the other.” [4 a]. Robert Southey imagined the theatre as a site of revolutionary protest in Wat Tyler (1794) [3]. Summer of blood The Peasants revolt 1381 , Dan Jones Harper Collins E-Books ISBN John Ball in his sermon at Blackheath taught that all men were created equal, and that the 978-0-00-733148-2 [2009] ranks and stations of the social hierarchy were merely the inventions of their oppressors. [4] & [4a]. A Dream of John Ball Chapter III. They Meet at the Cross, William Morris, 1892 God he argued wanted the ordinary people to recover their original liberty before the age of http://morrisedition.lib.uiowa.edu/johnball/ch3.html Gentleman Abbots and Lords: [5]. “ The English Bible & the Seventeenth-Century Revolution” , Christopher Hill, Penguin Books, 1993, p.157, citing Pierre Bonnassie, “From Slavery to Feudalism in South Western “[F]alsness and guile have reigned far too long. Truth has been put under a lock. Europe “, [translation Jean Brrell, Cambridge U.P., 1991, pp. 2-3, 25-37, 51-6]. Falsness reigns in every flock ...Sin spreads like the wild flood, true love, that was [7]... Comrades ; Communism a World History , Robert Service , Macmillan , [2007 ], Chapter good, is fled, and the clergy work us woe for gain ...The commons is the fairest flower 1 Origins , pp.14 – 15 that ever God set on an earthly crown” [10]. [8] The History of England: Volume I, The Foundation, Peter Ackroyd, Macmillan, 2011, Chapter 25, The commotion, pp. 285, ISBN 978-0-230-706-2 HB The Archbishop of Canterbury put Ball in prison , adding that : [9]. Chronicles Jean Froissart, the translation of Geoffrey Brereton (Penguin 1968) p. 212 [10] . Mediaeval Socialism, Bede Jarret, Chapter III, The Communists, Published by DODGE, “[I]t would have been better if he had been confined there all his life, or had been put LONDON, 1913 http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19468 to death“. This did not though stop the Archbishop in “Set him at Liberty , for he could [11]. Radical Lives Melvyn Bragg EP1: Now Is the Time John Ball BBC Documentary 2014 not for conscience sake have him put to death” , Froissart's Chronicle, 1848. London https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4TAd8Cwjcg Books pp.652-653

More revolutionary oratory was ascribed to Ball on Corpus Christi Day , June 13, 1381 , when he made an appeal to the people to rise up against “evil lords and unjust judges who lurked like tares among the wheat” when he preached :

“For when the great ones have been rooted up and cast away, all will enjoy equal freedom – all will have common nobility, rank and power ” [11].

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Illustrations: Research Case Study: Chris Illustration 1: Front piece: London: A Pilgrimage. With illustrations by Gustave Dore Chris • Published: 1872 , London Chris is a dedicated volunteer, supporting clients and offering financial and benefits advice. • Formats: Book , Illustration , Image He began the project in January 2015 with a keen interest in the linkages between poverty • Creator: William Blanchard Jerrold , Gustave Dor[illustrator] and mental health. After speaking to clients and reflecting on his role as a Rochdale • Held by: British Library Community Champion adviser he decided to complete a piece of reflexive research • Usage Terms: Public Domain examining his impact as a volunteer on both his own personal development and the • Shelfmark: Wf1/1856 development of his clients. Chris reflected that he had never been thanked as much in his See more at: http://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/slums#sthash.rISw3Aas.dpuf working life as he had as a volunteer. This notion of care and human thankfulness inspired Chris to write a reflexive piece that considers his journey to and within Rochdale Community Illustration 2: “When Adam delved and Eve span Who was then the gentleman?” Champions. - From “A Dream of John Ball “, William Morris, 1892 Chris’s Reflective Project Illustration 3: Some accounts of the event attribute the following rhyming chant to the rebels: I worked in social care for over 30 years. I started as a trainee social worker, and, via child “When Adam delved and Eva span, /Who was then the gentleman?” We may not have care social work, specialist work with young offenders, managing an adult care social work any accounts of the uprising written from the rebels' perspective, but this manuscript team, and a variety of other management posts, I ended up "surplus to requirements" when illustration (depicting Eve spinning and Adam digging) evokes the sort of pre-hierarchical budget cuts began to bite. existence they may have imagined. This image comes from a manuscript at Corpus Christi College (University of Cambridge). Although I had an awareness of mental health issues I had never expected that I would suffer from anxiety and depression, but, having lost my job I experienced both, and truly discovered the difference between sympathy and empathy. As part of my recovery, aided by a period on medication and some sessions of CBT; I realised that I needed to do something about rekindling a sense of worth.

I was aware that the recession was having a negative impact not just on benefit claimants and the low waged, but also on people who had been in profitable employment but were now facing changed circumstances, and the prospect of being unable to maintain mortgage repayments and various other credit commitments. I enrolled on a 'money management' course, and began to volunteer at a resource centre that had been set up by a G.P. who I had worked with previously. I quickly discovered that budget advice for people experiencing benefit issues and debt problems was not what was most needed. I became re-accustomed with the benefits system, and learned about how to support people with debt problems.

Welfare Benefit Advisors hadn't been invented when I started my social work career. Social workers were expected to understand the benefit system in order to advocate on behalf of their clients. Increasing complexity resulted in appointment of specialist advisors, (paid less than social workers), initially through Social Services, and later absorbed into a corporate information and advice service. This service also became a victim of budget reductions; as were grants to the local Citizens' Advice Bureaux. To an extent my new found role therefore represented a 'return to my roots'.

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Although I continued to volunteer at the resource centre, about two and a half years ago I Degree: also became a Community Champion, where I undertook the same role, but with a borough Social sciences – reinforced knowledge and awareness of inequality. wide brief. I had the opportunity to take part in the Edge Hill research project last year, but Social work training: use of self. decided not to get involved, although I did act as a "critical friend" to one of the participants. I was aware how much other Community Champions had enjoyed the experience, and when Employment: the programme was repeated this year I decided that I wanted to get involved. I was keen Significance of mentors, both peers and managers. to choose a subject that might produce something that was of Youth justice work – systems intervention and power of peer groups practical/transferable/sustainable value rather than a piece of research that may be Discovering a cause - User involvement and empowerment. academically challenging but have little impact on changing practice. Impact of changed organisational ethos. Finish involuntary. Depression and anger. I had begun to make use of some mental health training that I had received as a Community Champion, and 'weave' this into my financial support work with people who were suffering Post-employment: from depression as well as having money problems. Examining the effectiveness of this Loss of role 'blended approach' was my initial choice for my research project, but I felt that some type Experiencing depression and receiving CBT, understanding and recovery. of external verification would be required in order to validate any positive benefits resulting from this work. The Edge Hill tutors questioned the need for this, and suggested that my Volunteering: training and experience meant that my perception about the outcome of my input could be Regaining role, making a positive difference. Countering injustice on an individual basis, seen to provide sufficient validity. challenging ‘the system’ to an extent.

For a long time I have been aware that my ‘go-to’ learning style is ‘experiential’, i.e. learning This exercise gave me, for the first time, an insight and understanding of my motivation for through doing. The flip side of this is that I have never been very good at, or spent time on what I did, and do, and what has shaped my practice. Some of this came as quite a surprise, reflection. I was encouraged to consider what may provide justification for the tutors’ view particularly the significant and lasting theme of the importance of systems intervention of the validity of my perception. alongside work with individuals. The exercise also reinforced the value that I place on some principles that I was aware of, especially peer support, user-led services and empowerment. I remember at one of my first job interviews, in response to me having said that ‘I wanted One other outcome was that I realised that I have received more thanks for my support as to work with people’, I was asked why I hadn’t considered becoming a bus driver. I’d given a volunteer in the last few years than in decades as a social care professional. little thought to my motivation other than a general feeling of altruism – it was just the right thing to do to help people who were worse off than yourself. Although I found this reflective exercise was extremely valuable it raised the question of what comes next in relation to the research topic? This interview question might have triggered me to examine my ‘drivers’ in more depth, but it didn’t. Even through my social work training, and my long and varied professional career I've finally decided on a piece of action research that I think fits the bill, (of being purposeful in social care, I never gave detailed consideration to how I’d ended up doing what I did. in effecting change), and which I am keen to pursue. My plan is to use the development of The ‘Edge Hill experience’ was the first time I’d embarked on a reflective exercise focusing a 'Recovery Republic' style resource in Kirkholt as my topic. on what has shaped my values – how have I become the person that I am? This was a potential research topic in itself, though it felt extremely self-indulgent. I think that it will be really exciting to look at how a genuine community led approach can produce meaningful information about needs in the area, and, more importantly, how such 4,000 words of reflection/introspection later, the summary of the key influences on my life was: an approach could result in development of services that deliver peer support by/of/from the community. Childhood: Working class neighbourhood where people looked after each other. Mum cared for her My guess would be that there may well be common themes/issues shared by Kirkholt and father and later her mother when they were chronically ill. Parents were church-goers – other neighbourhoods that might inform 'Service delivery', but the major significance will ‘christian’ principles. be looking at how we may develop a model of community led needs assessment, and consequent solution focused approaches that can be replicated in any area of the borough School: (and, potentially, beyond?!) Scholarship - privileged education, encouraged awareness of others less fortunate.

Gap year: Voluntary work in UK rather than overseas – recognition/awareness of deprivation.

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Research Case Study: Jan Due to my disabilities and long term health issues, I needed so much help from my partner Jan Andrew to do daily tasks. I felt the need to give something back “I NEEDED TO BE NEEDED” Jan is an experienced and passionate volunteer supporting clients and offering financial I went back to volunteering under a very, very different set of rules. (Yes, rules, that’s what and benefits advice. Jan has a wealth of experience to offer benefits advice as both a it felt like for me). But now two years on, I realise those rules are safeguarding guides which Rochdale Community Champion and having volunteered for other organisations such as as champions we help to make. These guides I mention are critical to champions as they Sure Start in the past. Jan keeps a reflective diary and having reviewed this diary, felt that help protect us and the people we support. key themes arose around the impacts that Benefit difficulties had on claimants. Jan decided to interview people asking them about the effect that benefit difficulties had had on them When I started my community champions training I found it difficult and emotional. I began and how they felt, their mental health and the impact that benefit challenges had upon them to understand better and had a clearer understanding how my need to help had been truly and their families. Jan’s research reveals a range of impacts, especially the effect on the and utterly taken advantage of. I was doing the work of a paid worker it was also making extended family. This is an issue that is not normally considered and is an important me poorly. conclusion of Jan’s interviews. During training we spoke openly about our experiences and we were taught some solution Reflective Case Study Jan; focus training Helen asked for a volunteer to help demonstrate scaling. When Helen started Not long after meeting Sophie I became a community champion. to ask me questions about problems I was having with somebody, I began to realize the implications of my way of supporting was damaging me. I remember clearly that feeling of I was referred to the community champions through my engagement officer from the council total anguish; I broke down in front of a room full of strangers. It was only during this exercise I had recently stopped volunteering at my local TARA (tenants and residents association). (of scaling) that I had really only just had the “light bulb moment” Kate had been trying to My engagement officer helped me to find funding to try and continue my volunteering at a show me for months. local children’s centre. The “light bulb” moment has become my life saver. I can hear you all thinking as you’re After some calls Helen said she could support me in my role as volunteer. During the 1st reading this “that’s a bit dramatic” but I promise you it is and has become my life saver. I three months of becoming a champion I had so many misgivings, as the role of a community experience a lot of health issues, I don’t want you to feel sorry for me or think “OMG how champion was such a long way away from the role I had carved for myself over the years I does she do it, or why does she volunteer” but please ask yourself “why can’t she volunteer” had been volunteering. Before I became a community champion I never went anywhere alone. Suddenly I felt threatened, scared and nervous, due to the discussion I was constantly having with Nicola and Kate. They were concerned I was being taken advantage of by the I didn’t feel good about myself. people I was supporting I didn’t feel I had a voice. I really couldn’t grasp or understand what I was hearing. One time at champ chats Kate came to speak to me. She asked if I was OK, obviously I said yes, but Kate knew better. I didn’t have confidence. She asked me to take a few weeks off from volunteering / supporting, and my calls I received I had to take their name and numbers and pass their details on to Kate. I had an unhealthy need to be needed.

At this time clients had my personal number and could contact me 24/7. Kate was really I didn’t feel I mattered. concerned about this so that’s why she asked me to write down the clients who did contact me during this break. My life was everybody else’s, not mine I felt a burden.

I had over three weeks break from supporting. These three weeks were the most eye Due to the support, love, expert training, many challenges and some heated debates my opening weeks of my life. I had come to realise how much I needed my clients “NEED OF life today is completely unrecognisable. It couldn’t be any different if I had dreamed my life ME” this had become an intensely misguided relationship which I had formed. out as it is now.

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Being a community champion changes you if you let it and enjoy all of the challenges given Research Case Study Welfare Reform Act 2012: Jan to you. This has only been possible due to the fantastic team behind me, and all the other community champions. Helen, Kate, Nicola, Simon, Ethen and now Aleem are amazing. As The Welfare Reform Act 2012 is an act to make provision for Universal Credit and personal champions I do feel sometimes we don’t really realize all the hard, tough, relentless work independence payment; to make other provisions about social security and tax credits. To our team does for us. I often think of them as a group of beautiful swans elegantly gliding make provision about the functions of the registration service, child support maintenance along the water effortlessly, but if you could only imagine the amount of work, effort and and the use of job centre; to establish the social mobility and child poverty commission and energy it takes to look so flawless – AMAZING TEAM. otherwise amend the Child Poverty Act 2010 and for connected purposes.

All the training I have done over the last two years has helped me to transform my life Housing benefit reform came into force 1st April 2013 – the ‘under occupancy penalty’ completely. The people I support constantly tell me I have changed their lives. They would be in a hole without hope. I do find it so humbling when people tell me this, I also find it Family One difficult listening to the praise. Two Adults living in a 3 bedroom, 3rd floor flat. Sophie has mental health problems which she has had all her life. Sophie is 47 years old. Simon had a heart attack 12 months ago The Edge Hill training has really helped me to recognise and understand I have a role within and had undergone heart surgery. He really wants to go back to work but has been told this amazing group of people. Also, what I do has an impact on the people I meet and support. that it is unlikely that he will ever work again. Simon is 45 years old.

1. Empowering them to be able to fill in a form Due to the welfare reforms Simon can’t claim benefits in his own right. Sophie has to claim 2. Empowering them to talk to people in authority and deal with their own issues. for Simon under her claim. He does however receive national insurance contributions. 3. Empowering them to understand there is a way back from debt Their joint fortnightly income is £260. From this they have to pay 25% council tax which is £26 per month. These are just three things I do for some of the people I support, but these three things change my client’s lives. They feel they can achieve anything when they feel empowered. In October / November 2014 I helped Simon and Sophie apply for a change in circumstance Being a community champion has reconnected me with my life. I do all the things I want to as they had recently started sleeping in separate rooms. Sophie and Simons GP had do; I'm just able to understand and realize my limitations and expect them. recommended this to help with Simon’s recovery from his heart attack. I gave Sophie the relevant paperwork so that she knew what to ask her GP to do. I do hope when you’re reading this, you can realize and understand we as human beings set our own limitations, and it’s only when somebody shows you, In November / December the GPs letter of recommendation was dismissed so the under occupancy is still two rooms. So their under-occupancy rate was still 25% of their weekly Your true value, rent of £126 every four weeks. Your worth, I have interviewed them 3 or 4 times and as you can imagine the topic I wish to talk to them Your potential, within you that is when we can be truly grateful for ourselves as individuals about is very emotive so I decided to do a small time line of events. and unique human beings. - March / April Simon and Sophie’s housing benefit was stopped. Sophie didn’t want me This is what it means to me being a to deal with this issue. She felt that she wanted to do it herself. She realised that this was ROCHDALE COMMUNITY CHAMPION going to be difficult but she was determined to do it herself. - This change in Sophie she said was due to the support and encouragement I had given her. I had helped her to understand that being aggressive and confrontational would not help her to speak to the people she needed to talk to. - May. Sophie did still not understand why her benefits had been stopped but her income officer from her landlord’s offices were helping her. - Sophie was keeping in regular contact with her housing officer. Before March it had been myself who had been dealing with the income officer. At this time the housing arrears are at £2153.68 these arrears are under occupancy penalties only.

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Family Two As part of their research Rochdale Champs were encouraged to complete reflective logs. Roman is a single man aged thirty and he has a five year old son. He has been in and out Jan has shared her logs here; of work since leaving school. He lived in the family home with his dad and his nana. Jan Reflective Log ONE Roman’s dad suddenly died. He was left to look after his 93 year old nana. He was very happy doing this as he had been the main carer for his nana since she moved in with him Name: Jan Date of learning event: 14th June 2015 and his dad. Title of learning Event: Due to the welfare reform act Roman and his nana were ‘encouraged’ to give up their family home of sixteen years as they couldn’t afford the under occupancy penalty. Nana went into My experience of the subject prior to the learning experience. a nursing home. She was upset and distressed about leaving her home and Roman to live This could be a learning experience from your research e.g interviewing my first person alone. I have found it very emotional, heart wrenching and sometimes very frustrating

Roman moved into his own home, a one bedroomed flat. He found it extremely difficult. Facts Roman also had to help his son but didn’t have the money to give his son’s mum, to help How the knowledge was acquired? pay for his son. They both decided Roman would take him to nursery and pick him up. Talking (clients) me listening when Sophie comes to me for support. Roman started a job with a mobile phone company. His job was to cold call clients. He found that this job caused him anxiety and stress. What was the nature of the experience Explain the subject. In February 2015 Roman’s nana died. He was finding things extremely difficult. I had advised Sophie was anxious as her benefit has been stopped (without any letters, phone calls etc). him to go and see his GP as his mood was very low. He went to his job centre appointment I asked if it would be ok to use her experiences in my research. as normal, he told his adviser what had happened but she said she understood his feelings but he still had to do his 35 hours job searches. An account of what happened without specifying what was learnt.

During this time he had to help his family plan his nana’s funeral and sort out his nana’s Select the part of the event that was significant and/ or important to you. belongings. He didn’t manage to do his 35 hours job searches during this time. Listening and not commenting was hard. Not steering the conversation in a way I wanted.

Due to Roman’s increasing depression and anxiety I took him to see his GP who signed Feelings him off for three months. During March Roman found it very difficult to cope. This was very What aspect of the event went well? visible. Roman received a letter explaining another sanction. Because Roman hadn’t done Sophie’s ability to voice how she feels / felt safely. enough job searching hours within this period they decided to sanction him £10.40 off his Universal Credit for 91 days. This left Roman with less than £6 a month to live on for three What was not so good? months. Me having to sit and listen, not comment, Difficult.

Roman and the mum of his son are currently making a go of their relationship; slowly hoping What were my feelings about what happened? in the near future to live together. Roman gets his full Universal credit payment on 19th July Sadness, frustration, anger, useless – odd I know but relief at the end. which will be his first payment for 91 days. Sunday 14.6.15 1pm Felt it was time to put pen to paper and try to sort out all of my notes, so that they make some sense. I’ve had a great morning, its warm quiet and calm. I am trying to LISTEN more. I can hear the birds, children playing, life just passing by. While inside I feel all the frustration, hurt, confusion, anger, loneliness but mostly hopelessness. It is very difficult just listening.

What were the feelings of others? First sadness, frustration and confusion. At end – relief, happy, she felt better. She was able to ‘let it out’ as such

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Jan Reflective Log TWO Research Case Study: Julia

Name: Jan Date of learning event: 11th June 2015 Julia Julia is passionate volunteer for Rochdale Community Champions and offers literacy Title of learning Event: support to clients. Julia has a particular research interest in Middleton, an area just outside of Rochdale. Julia has an interest in the experiences of people in their fifties and sixties on My experience of the subject prior to the learning experience. benefits. She is conducting research via semi structured interviews and producing a This could be a learning experience from your research e.g interviewing my first person community drama with a group of people in their fifties in Middleton.

Interviewing Roman Below is a copy of the evaluation form that Julia used to gather research regarding participants experience of the drama group. Facts How the knowledge was acquired? DRAMA PROJECT EVALUATION. (Aug 2015) Talking and gently questioning Roman. 1. How did you find out about the Project?

What was the nature of the experience 2. Why did you decide to join the group? Explain the subject. Roman’s experiences of being on Universal Credit 3. Underline all or any of the words that say how you feel about it:- Learning new things. Wider Social Circle. Joint Effort. An account of what happened without specifying what was learnt. Confidence Building. Fun Way to Spend Time. Interesting. Talking, Discussions – feelings, Impact, More questions that I wanted to ask, Being Part of Something. Look Forward to Meetings. Liked Venue. Pulling answers through gentle questioning. Looking at things in new way. Brought out my Abilities. Team Player. Keeps me out of Mischief/The Pub. Why Not? It’s Free! Select the part of the event that was significant and/ or important to you. Something I always wanted to try! Someone Challenged me (said I couldn’t) Listening and not commenting was hard. Not steering the conversation in a way I wanted. Roman couldn’t put into words his experiences without gentle ‘pulling answers’ – open 4. Was there anything that wasn’t so Good or Difficult? ended questions. 5. Anything to Add? Final Comments? - Feelings What aspect of the event went well? 6. YOUR NAME: (Optional/ Initials Accepted) I learnt to ask open ended questions without having my own agenda.

What was not so good? Julia conducted detailed semi structured interviews with two participants regarding their The long silences; waiting for Roman to answer questions experience of literacy.

What were my feelings about what happened? Anger, Sadness – also become very close to Roman. Happy and excited too as there is a change in Roman

What were the feelings of others? Distress hopelessness, felt that he was useless; better not being here.

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CASE STUDY 1: M My second question for M was how and why did she eventually contact Rochdale Community Champions:- “M” has shortened her name so that she can write it and goes by this name which begins with the same letter as her Christian name because she has always had a literacy problem M told me she was going out shopping one day when she got the idea to walk into a local which she blames on the limitations of the nuns at her school in Ireland many years ago. school and approach the headmistress to ask where she could get help to learn to read. Now in her 70s and retired she has the time to address the problems that have dogged her all her life. Fortunately, the woman took her seriously and rang Rochdale Council to make enquiries. M was then referred to the Champions team who found me in her local area and asked me When M was young, people weren’t aware of Dyslexia and many pupils slipped through the to meet her at the Lighthouse Project in Middleton to find out what her needs were. M said net and never learned to read and write so M had a lot of problems as an adult – particularly it was a relief to find out it was not too late to get the help she needed. when she came to England and needed to get a job. I asked her to describe how she felt after our first meeting:- I asked M what her Early Experiences of Education were:- M said it was like a burden lifting from her shoulders! Someone friendly and non-judgemental She said the nuns tried to teach her the alphabet but most of it confused her and she was actually saying it was not her fault that she hadn’t learned to read all those years ago. struggled to make sense of any of it but could eventually write the four letters she used for When I had explained that she was probably dyslexic and tried out the coloured rulers with her name. The nuns sent her on lots of errands (Arranging the Church flowers was her usual her it opened up a whole new world to her. task) to avoid addressing her inability to read. If one of her teachers tried and failed to engage her in a reading task she would get a rap on the knuckles rather than a 1to1 session She had heard the word dyslexia over recent years but had no idea it could apply to her. to help her to learn to read. When I showed her the special books and the alphabet pages it all started to make sense to her and she finally felt that, with help, she may one day be able to read. She talked about her feelings of inadequacy made worse by her youngest sister being celebrated as “the clever one” in her family because she learned to read early and taught By the time the first meeting ended she knew she had done the right thing finding help and the alphabet to her siblings. (Her Parents were both illiterate apart from being able to sign felt her confidence had really grown and was determined to start learning as quickly as their names). M felt she was a disappointment to her parents but she planned to get married possible. She felt like a woman on a mission. She had found a new direction. She left feeling and be a housewife for the rest of her life because she was good at practical tasks. like she was floating on air.

Things didn’t always go to plan for M. Being a middle child she often had to compete for M worked very hard and it was evident that she practiced at home regularly because she attention and appreciation with her many siblings (being 1 of 8 in the family). She helped very quickly learned the basics and was soon able to read her first book (A children’s book her mother and older sister around the house while her brothers and younger sister went to with facts about zoo animals with just a few lines on each of its 12 pages). This gave her a college or to work. great sense of achievement and soon she was reading short rhymes and when I told her about my poetry group she was keen to join and show what she had accomplished. We Eventually, she got fed up of living at home and decided to follow a couple of her siblings also met at the library to choose Poetry for her. who had come to live in England. We re-set goals as she reached each milestone and, although she still needs to keep The problems started when she had to find a job: She could not fill in an application form checking she amazed herself that she could actually read at last and that the letters finally on her own so she asked her younger sister for help. seemed to make sense to her.

M wrote her name and the number of her residence but her sister had to fill in the rest as I had told M that because of the dyslexic tendencies and the need to keep checking, she she couldn’t even read the questions on the form. may never be a fast reader but at least she was understanding what she read and she could do simple exercises, enjoy find-a- word puzzles, make shopping lists, follow a recipe and M started working as a cleaner; firstly in a large private house in Prestwich owned by affluent understand letters she received for her hospital appointments. A year after she started she Jewish people. Then in a public house and eventually her pleasant personality and ability was proud to receive the Achievement Award I made for her and to be able to read it for to handle money saw her promoted her to a barmaid’s job. M soon learned to bluff her way herself. around the optics and beer labels as she had a very good memory. M then went to Ireland for a holiday and showed her sisters that she had started to learn to Her first husband, who worked there, never found out she couldn’t read or write. Her Second read. (Her parents having passed away years ago) husband never mentioned it. So for most of her life she had managed to avoid dealing with her literacy problems.

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When she came back she was so much more confident and asked me to help her with The CASE STUDY: A Highway Code as she had decided to start driving lessons. “A” is a retired gentleman I have known for some years and has lived in Middleton for many This was then part of her new sessions as her ability and confidence grew. Unfortunately, years. When I started the monthly Poetry group at The Lighthouse Project in the early M eventually had to stop the driving lessons as she needed an operation on her knee and months of 2014 I asked a few people if they were interested in Poetry and if they would like when she came out of hospital she was in a lot of pain and because of her age she took a to join a local group meeting monthly and discussing all aspects of poetry; reading, writing long time to recover. This also meant another break in her reading sessions. and listening to it -using monthly themes.

When she returned she had further setbacks and had got out of practice and had to go I asked A if he remembered where he first encountered poetry:- back to basics and recap on her reading skills. At this point I tried to make it more fun by finding more word-finder exercises and word games. E.g. filling in missing letters. Labelling A was immediately interested and told me he had enjoyed his poetry lessons at school and pictures etc. fondly remembers his English teacher who introduced him to poetry (mainly of the rhyming, rhythmic variety used with children.) He also recounted reading Shakespearean verse in his My final question for M was about how she felt that engaging with Rochdale Community Secondary school and being introduced to non-rhyming poetry and different forms. Champions had changed or improved her life and would she tell or recommend them to (Sonnets, Haiku, Limericks etc.) And even told how he sometimes wrote poetry which was others. deemed good enough for the classroom wall.

M was very pleased with the effect the Champions had on her life; I asked him how he felt about joining a group now he was retired and he asked about the - She no longer had to get help to read hospital letters (although the wording sometimes ages of other members as he did not want to be the oldest. I told him the group was for confused her so she would ask me or her husband or sister to confirm what she thought people of any adult age and I had other people interested who were older than him and he the letter was saying.) agreed to come along. - She could shop more confidently and made less mistakes when looking for the items she wanted. A became a valued member of the group as he remembered quite a lot of the classics and - She knew a lot about the Highway Code. would bring some of his own books or some poetry he had written when he was younger, - She had made new friends at the Lighthouse Project; The poetry group, The Knitting at school and afterwards. He said he found it a good way of putting some of his thoughts group and staff. and feelings together to reflect on later. He spoke of it as a discipline, a way of focussing - She could go to the Library and choose a book to read. (Poetry or prose) (She had on some aspect of life as he saw it. He also said that, for him, his poetry had to rhyme and joined for the first time in her life.) he spent a lot of time changing it so that it would. - She could read for Information, on any subject, in the library. He said there had been a gap of about 50 years from his early poetry experiences up to This meant she could find out things she hadn’t learned at school. joining the group. A needn’t have worried; the other members of the group found him informative and amusing as he turned out to have a gift for storytelling and making his early These were just some of the benefits that came from just asking the right person to help life very interesting whether it was through poetry or just talking about it. her. She also found her attitude to others had improved as she was less guarded about feeling ‘different’ because she had been unable to read so she felt more equal to literate Eventually, A started to write his own new poetry in the group and sometimes it didn’t have people. to rhyme because we discussed how the feeling of a poem was more important than the rhyme and sometimes that was what was needed so he became freer and more open in his Her attitude to life had also changed to a more positive outlook with more possibilities. She writing but he still admired people who could always easily get a rhyme as he had to work also said she would strongly recommend the Champions to anyone looking for help with at it. I’d told him he was too self- critical and that some poems were better for not rhyming literacy skills and now thinks it is never too late to start learning- Making up for the difficult if it meant the message got across. start she had encountered in her early life. A also got on well with the other members of the group and made a couple of new friends and met some younger people who he wouldn’t have got to know otherwise. (Although most of them didn’t come to the group more than a couple of times.)

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I asked A how he had benefitted from the group? Research Case Study: Norma Norma is a dedicated literacy volunteer. A teacher during her working life Norma has used He mentioned a more positive outlook and an improved willingness to give new people a her retirement to volunteer supporting client’s to develop their literacy, through Rochdale chance. (His divorce some years before had dented his confidence). He said it had improved Community Champions. Norma has developed her research from July 2014 to focus on his “personal enjoyment” of life and that he had begun to look at alternative activities to the story of one client. His anonymous story is told by Norma and illustrates the challenges going to the pub and he had become more interested in cultural activities. He had proved and frustration of attempting to navigate an extremely complex and frequently changing to himself that he still had a working brain even though his body was less able to do the welfare system as a learning disabled person. things he used to in his younger, more active days. Poetry was something he could still do in spite of the ageing process. Norma’s research will soon be available on the I4P website www.edgehill.ac.uk/I4P

A also said that Poetry brought back pleasant memories and took him out of himself if he Much of the research is on-going and forms part of longer term work that is being continued was in a low mood and stimulated his memory so it was both Nostalgic and Therapeutic. by the community champions. What is shared within this section is simply a snap shot – of (Use it or lose it). It uses up brain power that we often neglect. It could help us to focus on the full research that individual champions have conducted contact Rochdale Community other things remembered from times past like stimulus to other senses. It made him feel Champions. younger and more useful telling his stories and anecdotes to the group. Coming to the monthly sessions gave a purpose to the days and gave him something to look forward to. The monthly themes also gave him something to focus on.

I then asked what A thought about the Community Champions he said I was the first one The Research Process: Challenges, Surprises and Successes he met and he had not heard of them before but he has now noticed others at the Project. He said he found them helpful and friendly; plain-speaking and respectful and “not too Participatory Research by its very nature involves engagement and involvement in the bossy” and he would highly recommend the services to others. He had also talked to “M” process. Participatory research with its Social Justice goal involves a researcher about how she had benefitted from the literacy sessions and said it was a much needed engagement with the area of research. This involvement in the research and the process of skill that often gets overlooked with older people. conducting the research had some intended and unintended consequences. When the Rochdale Community Champions completed the Leadership and Research Methods A was full of praise for the people who had helped him feel less isolated and has since joined Training in January 2015 several volunteers were keen to continue the training into a locally another group – Rochdale Circle, for older people, and has had practical help and social based research project. inclusion with them. In the past he said he would have been suspicious of joining groups especially the ones that catered for all age groups but now he is one of the younger ones Between January 2015 and September 2015 volunteers developed their research project in his new group and goes on outings and day trips with them. He now feels his life is much ideas and considered how they would conduct their research project. Some volunteer more fulfilling. groups met regularly, weekly, in Number One Riverside, Rochdale Council Buildings to discuss and prepare their research. Other volunteers worked from home considering and developing research questionnaires and semi structured interview questions. Some volunteers that were keen to develop the research had to drop out due to health or family issues.

Volunteers really appreciated the freedom that they were given by Edge Hill University to choose their research. Edge Hill staff were keen not influence Rochdale Champions’ research ideas, as we wanted their research to be fully participatory and self-initiated. This flexibility was appreciated by volunteers, one volunteer used the phrase “you’ve given us wings.” Volunteers really appreciated the opportunity to share ideas and thoughts and to be allowed the time and the space to do it. One volunteer fed back; “it’s well good” another volunteer commented “I loved the freedom to have an idea and run with it.” The support sessions offered by Edge Hill University were structured as open appointment sessions where Edge Hill staff were happy to talk through ideas offer and advice or simply listen to volunteer thoughts. This was appreciated by the Rochdale Champions; “{the} focus on ideas and thoughts is brilliant.” Champions liked the fact that the University is working with the community, in coproduced research.

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The advice sessions that followed the initial four day training were very much valued by What have you learned and what advice might you give to new Rochdale champions. The time to share / explore issues and ideas with other champions Rochdale Champions starting the Leadership & Research Training? over the guided lunch seminar sessions offered volunteers “head space” as one volunteer put it. The addition of the collectively produced animation and radio play alongside this In terms of what participants learnt from the project; participants fed back that it felt like celebration event was also very much valued by volunteers. part of a positive process and completing being part of being a champion. Champions felt that they would advise others to do the training. The training was felt to be challenging but One champion reflected that the course had given them the “Confidence to reflect and a challenge that people can rise up to. Champions felt that they would advise other breathe; the Edge Hill project has helped me to do that.” The Edge Hill University course volunteers to definitely do the course, the course has offered an empowering supportive had reinforced reawakened and improved volunteers’ motivation; environment. However the course required self-directed learning, volunteers were not told when to stop with their research so volunteers advised future participants to pace “what’s been really good – the sharing and coming together of load of individuals with lots themselves, and know their limits. of motivations and gains. We are all very different and our core values are what unite us. And you don’t get it usually - this project has been good.” Listening was another key piece of advice. Not starting a semi structured interview with a preconceived idea but going out into the community and listening to people. In terms of Champions had been brought together by a commonality of values within the project. It practical advice regarding semi structured interviews; keeping interviews short and simple was shared that there was a peculiar synergy of people that the research group seemed to was something that champions had learnt. This had enabled champions to sometimes give be likeminded people together. This was part of the enjoyableness of the course, the space and let people time to think in their own head. Champions spoke a lot about having sociable side of it, all part of the sharing and building of group. learnt a lot about listening.

In terms of development for the next cohort of leadership and research sessions then Advice was shared that future project participants shouldn’t be put off by the University creating a peer led study group was suggested. This was suggested as an informal monthly logo, the project was do-able. Advice was given that new participant should break their get together over a drink to support each other’s research. Planning the dates in advance project down into small steps, not to feel under pressure and to ask for help. Peer support was requested. Edge Hill University had aimed at flexibility by developing the program on was felt to be a key element of the leadership and participatory research project. It was a rolling basis however volunteers requested a more structured series of dates. For the next about selling the leadership and research training correctly; people like the university tag cohort of sessions volunteers would like to see more people involved, a more diverse group but the course was also accessible for people who want to do it. of volunteers. For some the celebration event and the deadline for submission into the celebration book was not ideal and one volunteer commented that they would like on-going In conclusion, the 2015 cohort of Rochdale Community Champions have engaged in a research over a longer period. This request has now been arranged so that Edge Hill staff broad range of research projects represented within this celebration booklet, a collectively can have a long term research support group and a new cohort of researchers supported produced animation and a radio play. Some of the champion’s research projects conclude simultaneously. here and are represented within this booklet, other projects are longer term and only a snap shot of the project is within this booklet.

The project has been empowering, supportive, challenging and engaging for all involved. What has come out of the evaluations is that the project has inspired volunteers and reminded them of the difference that they make in their communities. In a world were poverty is increasing, Welfare Reform is ever changing, Rochdale Community Champions working directly within their own communities weave humanity through bureaucracy.

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AFTERWORD: Appendix One John Cater – Vice-Chancellor Edge Hill University Proposal from the Institute of Public Policy and Professional Practice (I4P) at Edge Hill I want to start by saying how pleased I am that the Edge Hill continues University (Lancashire) to work with Rochdale's Community Champions to support their on- to be involved in this important and innovative project. I am very proud going personal and professional development in 2015 and 2016 too of our own long history of innovation and change . We were the first non-denominational women only provider of teacher education in Overall Rationale: the country 130 years ago. And in 2014 our track record and Since the autumn of 2013 staff from I4P have worked with members of Rochdale’s commitment to being open to change and responsive to our students Community Champions initiative as part of an agreed programme of support and and to our regional and national communities was recognised when we development. The original proposal included four separate days linked to two themes became the University of the Year. (leadership and decision making and community based research). Following the completion of the four days for those members of the group who wished to undertake a small scale Today, teacher education is now only a minority part of what we do, whether it is preparing piece of enquiry staff from I4P and the RCC support team worked with individuals. In July the next generation of health and social work professionals or developing our provision 2014 a ‘Celebration’ event was held at which a report outlining the work of the Champions across the full academic curriculum; as part of our support for the creative industries we was produced and certificates of participation were awarded by the University. even have our own recording label! The model for 2015: Our commitment to the wider communities of the North West is an essential part of our This programme in 2015 was based upon a series of discussions between Rochdale and broader strategic goals and ambitions. The work with Rochdale and the support we have the University in which it was agreed that the Project (the Community Champions) would offered to the Community Champions represents only one aspect of our support for working again be supported by a number of development days led by staff at the University. The with and alongside community based organisations, public authorities and the third sector. overall aim of these development days was to enhance the work already undertaken in Rochdale; to enable the Champions to act as independent, self-confident, self-reflective One of the reasons we established our Institute for Public Policy and Professional Practice advocates and to support their personal and professional learning in agreed areas of critical (I4P) was precisely to give these relationships and activities a clear focus and direction. I enquiry and reflection. know that we have much to offer communities and practitioners working across the region, but I also know that we have much more to learn from listening to you and reflecting upon The work for 2015 included the following: what we do and how we can develop and improve further. 1. For all members of the Community Champions an opportunity for a structured review and reflection day facilitated by Professor John Diamond. This was introduced last year and I recognise the potential offered by the Rochdale Community Champions in supporting local provided an opportunity with the help of an external facilitator for the Champions to discuss communities and residents. I hope that we can continue to support you in your work. their role(s), their expectations and the level and quality of support they were receiving from the central support team. For those members of the group who will access the four days Thank you. on individual and collective leadership this will provide an opportunity to outline the programme and discuss the potential outcomes.

2. Four Structured Days on Individual and Collective Leadership – for up to 20 Community Champions. The focus of these four days was to unpick and to explore the different ways John Cater in which the Champions act as ‘leaders’ and decision makers. We examined these different ways of working through case studies and role plays in which different leadership roles were examined from ‘leaders as advocates’ to ‘leaders as facilitators and mediators’ to ‘leaders as critical reflective practitioners’ to ‘leaders as evidence based decision makers’. Over the four days we attempted to model participatory ways of working as the group explored and reflected upon their own (and the collective) approach to leadership . We used different approaches to decision making as a way of exploring and examining how they work as individuals as well as part of a group. From our earlier work with the Champions we were aware of there being a strong sense of group identity and we wanted them to reflect upon that and to think about how that informs (positively as well as negatively) how they act and inter-act. We used the idea of ‘evidence based decision making’ as a way into their reflection on how they used evidence in their advocacy role and how this might be developed further.

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3. We hoped that members of the group would be willing to keep a record of their thinking Appendix Two – Screen Shot of Session Slides and ideas through a diary –visually as well as in a written form if they wish – and that they would share these ideas with the group on Day Four. As part of establishing a continuing support programme we suggested that by Day Four for those that wish we would agree how they might reflect upon their use of evidence and what counts as evidence. We imagined that such discussions might centre on decisions already taken (how were they arrived at, who took the decision, what did they consider in taking the decision and this could include decisions within the setting of the Champions to the decisions by public agencies in Rochdale) to how do you inform or shape decisions (what constitutes as evidence, how is it identified, collected, measured and understood). We set out how we could help them undertake these small scale projects leading to an opportunity in July to share and reflect on the learning which has taken place.

Outcome: As part of the activity agreed with the Group a report (outlining the small scale projects undertaken) will be produced by the University. In addition the Group produced an animation outlining the work of the Champions. A celebration day is now planned for September.

New for 2015/16: Appendix Three – Screen Shot lunch time seminar slides. Delivery: Seminar – Research Techniques The proposal is that above programme of activity will take place in Rochdale in the offices of the local authority or at the Town Hall.

It is proposed that we run the programme again incorporating the changes outlined above. The evaluation and feed back from the participants suggest that this model (three days together and then a follow up day with support days ) worked more effectively than the previous iteration of the programme.

The proposed addition is that we offer 5 support days for those who have completed the programme but wish to develop a project or initiative which sits within the remit of the Champions.

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Appendix Four - Screen Shot lunch time seminar slides. Appendix Five – Who’s Who and how to find out more Seminar – Ethics and Informed Consent Rochdale Borough Council Rochdale Borough Council aims to be a council which builds success and prosperity with our citizens and partners, whilst protecting its vulnerable people. www.rochdale.gov.uk/

Rochdale Community Champions Community Champions are people from across Rochdale Borough who make a positive difference by helping others. They are real people, men and women of all ages and backgrounds who have the time, commitment and skills to offer support. Some have professional backgrounds and use those skills as a volunteer. Others are "expert by experience" or have developed their skills through training. Community Champions are available to help you with lots of different issues. www.rochdale.gov.uk/jobs_and_training/volunteering/community_champions.aspx

Edge Hill University Edge Hill Universities Mission statement is “Creating and harnessing knowledge to deliver opportunity”. Edge Hill is a leading campus university with a strong focus on employability, delivering an outstanding student experience. www.edgehill.ac.uk/about

I4P The Institute for Public Policy and Professional Practice (I4P) is a cross-disciplinary research and knowledge exchange initiative established in 2013 based at Edge Hill University. The changing and changed context of public policy and the role of public agencies is in a period of change. The Institute is committed to exploring the opportunities for cross sector collaboration and co-operation and to draw on the experience of practitioners as well as academic researchers to inform new ways of working and learning. www.edgehill.ac.uk/i4p/

ARVAC ARVAC is the Association for research into the voluntary and community Sector. ARVAV aims to act as a resource to people interested in research in or on community organizations, to promote and help develop effective and appropriate forms of research in or on community organizations. ARVAC aims to encourage and facilitate networking and collaboration between people undertaking work in this field and ensure that the findings of research in and on community organizations are made available to policy-makers at all levels. ARVAC plays a role in identifying gaps in knowledge of the community sector and the need for further research. www.arvac.org.uk

NIACE The National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) aims to encourage all adults to engage in learning of all kinds. www.niace.org.uk

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References Baum, F., MacDougall, C., Smith, D. (2006) Participatory action research. Journal of Epidemiology Community Health 60(854-857).

Community Champions (No Date) “Happy to Help: Rochdale Community Champions” http://www.rochdale.gov.uk/pdf/Community%20Champions%20overview%20and%20tra ining%20model.pdf

Mienczakowski, J (2013) Ethno drama: Performed Research – Limitations and Potential in Atkinson.P, Coffey.A, Delemont.S, Loftland.J and Loftland.L (2013) Handbook of Ethnography Sage, London

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