Saturday 28th February, 2015 – There is a great day of volunteering opportunities for the Fellowship in Cambridge this weekend. Visit The Guildhall and see!
Members of the regional Fellowship will be abroad, supporting 80 Cambridge based organisations who are ‘…working to create positive social and environmental change through volunteering‘.
‘The aims of the fair are to get more people involved in volunteering, bring together organisations with shared aims and to break down the town/gown divide by opening the event up to students and locals alike. Anyone and everyone in Cambridge is welcome to attend!’ The Cambridge Hub
This is a great event that offers many opportunities for Fellows, anybody in fact, to seek out and engage with a broad range of organisations in Cambridge.
Volunteer and donate time and your specialist knowledge to any one of these great organisations. If you are a Fellow in Cambridge, or its hinterland, here is the event to start your journey with a new community.
By supporting The Hub, you are also helping students at Cambridge support and make a contribution to communities, helping them tackle their social and environmental issues. Working in a collaborative and supportive way. You can see the story of The Hub here.
Image credit: Painting for the community – picture courtesy of The Cambridge Hub.
This is a new report from Anna Coote, the Head of Social Policy at the New Economics Foundation. People, Planet, Power – Towards a new social settlement is an attempt to re-define the shape of economy and community, and how these concepts are leveraged through socio-political and econo-social models onwards through the 21st Century.
A new social settlement?
This NEF report is an engaging, challenging and thoughtful piece of work. It chimes well with current RSA intellectual modelling of the same themes.
The RSA thought leadership, and the recent strategic review at the Society, led to challenging aims for this year on focus, impact and joining up.
What has emerged has been a three-pronged change aim scenario for the work of RSA Fellows and the Society. This is neatly all encapsulated by the driving force of Matthew Taylor’s keenly edged concept of The Power to Create.
The thematic change aims for 2015 of the RSA are given below…
Public services and communities
Creative learning and development
Economy, enterprise and manufacturing
Reading A New Social Settlement you will find long echoes and a contingency of similar RSA aims and concerns about inequality, elite power, creativity and community empowerment.
NEF‘s aims for their new settlement are stated thus…
This settlement has three main goals: social justice, environmental sustainability, and a more equal distribution of power. There is a dynamic relationship between these goals; each depends on the others for fulfilment. Addressing them together means aiming for sustainable social justice, which requires a fair and equitable distribution of social, environmental, economic, and political resources between people, places, and – where possible – between generations.
In summation, Anna Coote stresses that the NEF report lays out a new set of goals and objectives, and offers some illustrative effects that can achieve them.
It is though, perhaps more importantly, that the semiotic significance of strategic review at the RSA and the concentration by other leading thinkers on societal change and economic renewal of an equitable kind, all indicate that a sea-change may be under way.
The partiality of tax gatherers, the greed of bankers and the ‘socially neutral’ activities of global business may, at last, be under assault.
Be part of the debate, be part of a movement that puts equality of distribution, whether economic, social or intellectual, at the forefront of its aims. Be part of the RSA?
On Saturday 7th February, 2015 conversationsEAST are sponsoring an informal Open House drop-in event at their offices in Cambridge. Tim Smith FRSA will be holding a Fellowship Counsellor surgery, in his role as Fellowship Counsellor for the East of England. (Tim’s sponsored programme covers the region at monthly intervals or so. See more here...)
He’ll also be wearing his hat as Editor of this on-line publication, so a well as his Fellowship Council agenda, if you have a Fellow led project you would like support for, or to talk with another Fellow around funding, governance, communications or operational development…Tim will be on hand from 10.00am.
If you are intending to bring a charabanc of a dozen Fellows or so, do let Tim know, as our loft space will quickly fill up. See more details of Tim’s agenda and contact details for the day, including the creation of a women’s group to advance the interests of female Fellows in the region, here…
RSA Engage
‘The Power to Create is the theme of much RSA work this year and this Connect event will bring local Fellows (an interested others) together to discuss both local issues and exciting work coming out of the RSA’.
The RSA are currently about to deliver a suite of RSA Engage events in the Eastern Region. There are forthcoming events in Ipswich, Cambridge and other Fellow population centres. See details below.
These Engage events are a great opportunity to meet the team from The House and to develop contacts and share ideas with other Fellows, or yet to be Fellows too. See you there?
As part of the Fellow led Chelmsford Remembers Project there is an upcoming joint meeting of RSA Chelmsford and The Civic Society at Anglia Ruskin University , Chelmsford.
Date: Monday 9th February, 2015 – 5.45pm for 6.00pm start
Venue: Room 001, The Sawyer Building, Anglia Ruskin University.
We are very pleased to announce that our guest speakers for the event will be Air Vice Marshall Ray Lock CBE, who is Chief Executive of the Forces in Mind Trust(FiMT) and Professor Jamie Hacker Hughes from the Veterans and Families Institute at Anglia Ruskin University.
This event, as part of Chelmsford Remembers, links the centenary commemorations of the First World War to the effects of deployment to war zones today. Other items include…
Final report on the Ideas Festival 2014 (IF2014) and the initial consultations on 2015. IF2015 will run from the 18th October 2015 to 1st November inclusive.
Update on negotiations on future uses for the Hall Street Marconi Factory.
Notifications on upcoming Chelmsford Remembers event with Dr. Paul Rusiecki author of The Impact of Catastrophe – The First World War.
If you are able to attend, do please confirm with Malcolm Noble – (mnoble3211 at yahoo.com), or use our ‘contact us’ panel above and send Malcolm a message directly from this web page.
During the summer of 2014 the Society sent out a survey to the Fellowship, seeking their responses on a number of issues and asking for their views and comments.
Below is a copy that analysis, garnered from the 29% of Fellows who responded, along with some thoughts from the conversationsEAST team as to how our contribution to the work of the Fellowship might be flexed, in response to the findings.
The summary findings from The House indicated the following…
“Overall responses to the survey were positive. Over two-thirds of Fellows join–at least partially–to support our mission, the quality of almost all of our outputs is seen as very high and by far the majority of Fellows are intending to renew their Fellowship. The Survey also generated a large amount of information that can be used to guide ongoing Fellowship development”.
Key findings included…
There is less satisfaction with local events compared to other areas of our work.
There are a large number of Fellows wanting to self- organise but are frustrated at being unable to do so.
There are a large number of Fellows wanting to self- organise but are frustrated at being unable to do so.
Some Fellows want to be more involved in the work we do.
There is a lack of knowledge about what we do. Across the seven RSA Projects included in the survey, `have not heard of it at all’ accounted for between a quarter and a half of all responses.
Younger people and females are less likely to recommend the Fellowship to suitable people than others
There are strong regional variations in how Fellows perceive the RSA.
(Key findings drawn from the RSA Fellowship summary report – Ed.)
Looking forward into 2015 we have recently published our ‘road-map’ as a journal, where we have been working with Tim, our new Fellowship Councillor in the East, to develop a series of gatherings to explore how Fellows can become more engaged with the Society.
We will, as stated, pivot these, supporting Tim directly in the delivery of a series of Fellowship Councillor Surgeries across the region. This might help inform and engage the interested Fellowship directly. Offering an informal setting, with refreshments, for the survey itself to be discussed and for Tim to explain and heighten awareness of the work and input of the Fellowship Council itself. One of the findings in the survey was that many Fellows were unaware of the function of the Fellowship Council, for example.
Another way forward, we would argue, would be to foster the engagement of female Fellows, either as new Fellows, or to develop some way to engage with the Fellowship on a gender basis. We have written before in this journal and in our regional annual reports about the gender imbalances, including in the Fellowship, in our region.
(We could start an Otrera Group in every region to foster the engagement and promotion of Fellowship skills by gender, for example? -Ed.)
If this imbalance in Fellowship is ‘normalised’ across all regions, we would look to develop a campaign/project to engage by gender across adjacent regions for example. Sharing both the information in the recent survey, but garnering explicit local knowledge on gender bias as part of the project initiation work.
(Having talked so long about the matter, it seems that a short burst of positive discrimination, in terms of engagement and resources, might go a long way? -Ed.)
In our publishing activities we will develop a ‘Fellows have their say!’ web journal page. Where the Fellowship can directly contribute to the regional debate in the East. This might be particularly useful in bolstering the regional events catalogue in terms of feedback or activity recommendation. All this information will be passed directly and securely to the Eastern Region Fellowship team, of course.
We will foster and web publish a set of ‘View from the Fellowship Council’ reports. Getting Tim to write a regular review of Council activity and debate, in a generalised way, which can feed into regional meetings and, more importantly, be immediately available to the wider regional Fellowship. Helping to support and deliver a clearer understanding of its work and role.
We think the new RSA web site, arriving this month, which will enable Fellows to contact each other directly if they wish, offers an important and effective mechanism for pan regional co-operation, as well as improving inter-region project and activity development. We look forward to reviewing it on our web pages.
Also useful, we believe, will be the launch of artSUFFUSION, our sister arts focused web journal. We are refining the publication manifesto this month.
We hope that by combining the arts, crafts and making into one energy stream in the region, whilst connecting new conversationsEAST social enterprise start-up projects, we can also help convert our Society’s brilliant research papers and mission into real world examples of sustainable community business and social outcome funded projects.
We look forward to 2015, hoping that our readers will come along with us?
At this time of year everyone reflects a little on their progress in the previous twelve months, and more often than not, looks forward to the next twelve, with joy or trepidation depending on personal circumstance.
One factor of life that will not change is the ubiquity of the web and the range of services available for the owners of the right ‘machinery’, or for those who have access to it.
This journal is the product of Fellowship imaginations, but others are looking at the world and re-imagining news, reflection and analysis too. Below are some great ways that you can commit to developing knowledge and understanding, all at no cost…beyond that all important access to machinery!
Wonker – a complex news analysis engine:
This is a brave attempt to develop and share knowledge and understanding about the critical social, economic and community development conflicts across the globe.
Just getting started, but with a vast task in front of them, Casey and Nick the creators of Wonker, risk burn-out or perhaps even take-over by mainstream news outlets if the concept becomes a raging success. The site currently offers analysis of the ISIS crisis and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict for example.
That said, even if you are a ‘policy wonk‘ already, the site offers a great way to get contextual analysis from outside your own professional field of endeavour. Alternatively, you can use your professional knowledge to contribute to the Q & A style presentation of Wonker.
As with all user contributed content, there are potential questions of political bias, Americo-centrism in this case or even propogandism as the site develops. It is however, we think, a brave attempt to make clear the complicated to either the disengaged or the distracted, one conflict at a time.
Highbrow – expand your knowledge universe, one email at a time…
Not a new concept on the literate web, but this service is nicely presented for those who have just five minutes a day over ten days to become acquainted with a new field of study, one email at a time.
It’s not particularly clear on their web site, but you are constrained to one ten day course subscription at a time. Presumably to prevent burn-out or ‘knowledge fatigue’?
You can choose your starting date, in order to manage the light work-flow from the beginning. Courses you can choose from cover such topics as art, history, philosophy and psychology, amongst others.
It will be interesting to see the content as it develops over time, as the delivery is heavily dependent upon TED talks at the moment. Worth checking out, either as a refresher in a busy email day, or as context to develop a new interest.
If video access to fresh thinking is your mode of learning, then the RSA has a long history of offfering its audience the most topical material from thought leaders of the day.
The RSA can offer you a whole range of video talks and presentations from some great thinkers. The example below is one such. The need for a revolution in education, breaking the political and social bounds of the mind to create new worlds. (Makes me breathless just reading this…Ed.)
Debra Kidd argues for the creation of ‘architects of hope’ for young people. A powerful ambition and an idea well worth spreading. One interesting observation Debra makes is that individuals need to know what they are voting for and how the solutions offered by the political machinery are tinkered with by the self interest of the elected representative.
Knowledge, context and critical thinking are key. With a tsunami of information crashing over us, the tools and resources above can help with process, we would argue.
This interesting new RSA Animate looks at a revolution that is needed in teacher development. Work consigns teachers, it argues, to becoming victims who are trapped by the systems they operate within.
The goal should be to make change-makers, who are authors of their own pedagogy.
The essay collection which supports the argument posits that schools are conditioned by a command and control culture, which ignores creativity in delivery. The teacher, it argues, strives to educate whilst coping with a top down culture of compliance.
Get the essays here…
To best serve learners, and the professional development needs of teachers, there should be a methodology available that echoes and supports the research which shows students, who have the best teachers, can learn at twice the rate of other students.
The final essay from the collection is by Tristram Hunt, Shadow Secretary of State for Education. In the introduction to The Rationale for Revalidation: a movement to transform teaching, Hunt states…
The teaching profession is changing. One year into this job there are few things of which I am more certain. If this collection of essays achieves nothing else then it will be to highlight how the energy unleashed by this cultural shift has the potential to become a force for far-reaching education reform.
Whether you are just beginning your professional teaching career, ending it or are just passionate about education…there is much to think about in this RSA report.
To echo the perceptive analysis in this collection of essays, and to underscore how the change in pedagogy, the re-processing of education in general for the benefit of future generations is an ongoing project. We re-looked at Ken Robinson’s TED Talk How to Escape Education’s Death Valley.
Robinson, speaking and living in the USA, argues for change to support young people who drop out of school, and those who remain it, but who stay disengaged from the education process.
This is not a new message from Ken Robinson, but it is witty and discursive as well as telling, placing the young person at the centre of change in education.
A nice counterpoint to, and contextualision of, the thought processes and ideas revealed in our RSA essay collection above.
A little while ago a group of Fellows in Suffolk undertook a Human Centred Design course using the resources of IDEO.org (…see our archive of entries on our regional events page for more details).
IDEO have long had success with their Human Centred Design toolkit, which is an enabling mechanism for those interested in community development. The on-line course, which Suffolk Fellows undertook, has seen over 40,000 individuals from 148 countries wrangle with a specific problem in the last two years. That is poverty.
There is now a new development. IDEO have recognised that where the problems are most significant, then take-up of web resources can be limited. This may be to the complete absence of any technological infrastructure to engage toolkit users, or that the technology that is available is far beyond the community’s ability to acquire it.
Their solution is to create a printed book, the ‘old fashioned’ way of disseminating knowledge.
You can get involved and support the HCD book project. They are raising funds on KickStarter, where for very modest sums you are able to support the creation of this new medium, to the benefit of communities around the globe.
A pledge of 25 dollars will see you receive a pocket guide to Human Centred Design, with a 50 dollar or more pledge getting you a full copy of the toolkit in bound form.
Ipswich Arts Centre in association with Ipswich Historic Churches Trust and Re-Create are to establish a new Ipswich Arts Centre at St Clement Church.
In early November there will be an evening of talks, discussion, music and refreshment to celebrate the rebirth of St Clement as a new contemporary arts venue forming a bridge between the waterfront development and the town centre.
“The aim is to create a contemporary arts centre which will host national and international acclaimed acts in a diverse range of media including music, visual arts, performance, film and theatre. It will complement and support Ipswich’s existing cultural offer, placing Ipswich firmly on the regional and national cultural map.
The rebirth of St Clement as a contemporary arts centre aims to restore this beautiful 14th Century building, which provides a natural space for creative expression, where people can congregate and share in this experience”.
The opening of a new Arts centre in any community is a red letter day. The impending work at St. Clement is set in a long tradition of utilising redundant church property as theatres, community centres and libraries.
The creation of a new, full mix Arts Centre to add to the cultural context of Ipswich and East Anglia as a whole is very exciting indeed.
The project has already attracted media attention and has been featured on BBC news, The Stage and East Anglian Daily Times.
To discover more information about this new Centre and the role that UCS in Ipswich will play see…
Matthew Taylor has produced a new RSA Short to accompany the current drive to embrace creativity across society. See it below…
Matthew draws from his recent RSA Chief Executive’s lecture.
The message, that we should all embrace our creativity, is a telling one. Rigid thinking can bring with it the warm comfort of supposed ‘certainty’. However, to the creative mind ‘…every individual has the freedom and opportunity to develop their unique capabilities to the full’.
Oliver Reichardt, the RSA Director of Fellowship states that ‘…this concept will be central to our work(The RSA) in the future’. We warm to the sentiment at conversationsEast.
You can book your free tickets on-line with Eventbrite here.
