Ideas Hub

Great ideas and inspiring stories about communities, collaboration and co-production.

Highlights on the Hub

Read about the people who are getting on and making things happen.

by Helen Sturman

Rebuilding Community Connections with Not Another Co-Production Project

Helen Sturman, Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire Area Development Manager for Parkinson’s UK, shares her experience of being new in the job when joining Not Another Co-Production Project. She outlines the importance of flexibility when rebuilding community connections with people with long-term health conditions, and how co-production values the range of life experiences, knowledge and skills that people can bring.   …

Co-production, Community Based, Community Development, Community Engagement, Guest Blog, Voluntary Sector
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by Mel Parks

It doesn’t have to rhyme: Collaborative creative writing as a community tool

Mel Parks shares ideas on using collaborative creative writing in community settings to bring people together, creating a unified experience often with the added benefit of new insights and surprising connections. As well as being lots of fun! Many people are scared of poetry and creative writing often brings back memories of school, and often not good ones, so I…

Collaboration, Collective Power, Community Engagement, Storytelling, Wellbeing
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by Mel Parks

Not Another Co-Production Festival

It’s almost one year since we began our Not Another Co-Production Project and it’s time to celebrate all the amazing work that’s been happening with our partner organisations in Greater Manchester. And to help us celebrate, we’d like to invite you to join us at our Not Another Co-Production Festival! The first of its kind anywhere.  We are working with…

Co-production, Collaboration, Collective Power, Community Based, Community Development, Community Engagement, Event, Social Action, Voluntary Sector
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by Rachel Berry

Bridges Project: Co-production with young people in Scotland

For almost 40 years, Bridges Project has been supporting some of the most vulnerable young people in Midlothian and East Lothian in Scotland. For some, working with Bridges Project is the first time they’ve had a supportive adult in their lives. “A lot of our clients have said they feel like no one has shown faith in them, or believed…

Case Study, Children and Young People, Co-production, Wellbeing
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by Alex Barker

Encouraging women to the podium: Not just about speaking but about influencing

In late 2020, I was booked to speak at two very different conferences a few days apart. Both were public events where the content and the line up of speakers were the main draw.  The first one lasted two days. On the whole it was excellent, but I noticed one thing that rankled me. On both days, the first two…

Blog, Guest Blog, Power, Social Action, Storytelling, Systems Change, Women
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by Mel Parks

Clarissa on tour: A film created to improve the health of people affected by homelessness

During the autumn of 2021, Ideas Alliance teamed up with Groundswell to present a series of live screenings of Clarissa, a film created to help share the experiences of people affected by homelessness while accessing healthcare. The audience was made up of invited healthcare practitioners, NHS staff and staff working in homelessness support services, who all play a vital role in engaging…

Alliance, Arts, Co-production, Collaboration, Community Engagement, Health, Homelessness, Storytelling, Video
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by Rachel Berry

Smalls for All Supplies a Growing Number of UK Organisations

We talk about poverty more than we used to. What was once considered something that happens elsewhere is now undeniably a part of everyday life in the UK, for a growing number of families. And West Lothian-based charity Smalls for All (Smalls) can trace the line of this change from when it was founded as an African aid organisation in…

Case Study, Charity, Social Action, Social Value, Voluntary Sector
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by Rachel Berry

Jingle Bags: Christmas at East Lothian Foodbank

East Lothian Food Bank are making sure that families have a festive meal to tuck into this Christmas. Find out more about their Jingle Bags appeal, the difference it can make to families, and how they are working in partnership to address the root causes of food poverty.

Charity, Community Based, Family, Food
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by Isaac Samuels

We need to talk about “lived experience”

Lived experience is essential to co-production, but do we treat those who share their stories with us ethically? True co-production needs long-term thinking, proper support and the creation of opportunities for people who have experienced multiple disadvantage, argues co-production advisor Isaac Samuels in this powerful guest blog.

Alliance, Co-production, Community Development, Community Engagement, Leadership, Lived Experience, Storytelling, Systems Change
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by Immy Robinson

Understanding the 9 million active neighbours of lockdown

The coronavirus crisis saw a huge movement of community activity and support. Immy Robinson, co-lead of the Relationships Project, shares their research about what made people come together. How we can support the different types of active neighbour with an ecology that enables community activity to thrive?

Citizen-led Action, Community Based, Community Development, Community Engagement, Coronavirus Crisis, Covid Considerations, Guest Blog, Research, Social Action, Social Movement
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by Rachel Berry

Making Scotland “the best place in the world to grow up” through cross-sector collaboration

We look at Soil Association’s Food for Life Scotland programme and Scottish Book Trust’s BookBug programme, two examples of how Scottish Government, local government and the third sector are working together to deliver positive outcomes for children in Scotland.

Charity, Children and Young People, Collaboration, Education, Family, Food, Health
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by Ben Andrews

Beyond Empower: supporting healthy, active lives for disabled people by transforming mainstream spaces and services

In this guest blog, Beyond Empower founder Ben Andrews tells us about their work to transform mainstream spaces, communities and leisure services so that they're accessible to people with disabilities. By thinking differently about the barriers, Beyond Empower help providers, councils and businesses create services that everyone in the community can access and enjoy.

Asset Based, Co-design, Commissioning, Community Based, Community Development, Disability, Guest Blog, Health, Inequalities, Integrated Services, Social Enterprise, Systems Change, Wellbeing
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“The Hub acts as a glue bringing together people and organisations who are doing so much to positively disrupt their local systems.”

Burcu Borysik, Mayday Trust