Places Training Preparation Event

Date of the event: 14.10.10
Organised by: Target: Wellbeing and Mark Ellison from GONW
Venue: Foxton Centre, Preston (a Target: Wellbeing project)
Report by: Nancy Brown

This session was to develop the information we need to tell the story of
the Foxton Centre for the training on place based data we're running on 22nd November.

It was a session involving local service users, volunteers, workers, and
staff to look at how the Foxton Centre has worked within the local
community.

We'll use this to provide a case study for our training in November all
about how our projects contribute to neighbourhoods and how to use data to
show this. The highlights were learning about the work in the centre and the way
people see their neighbourhood.

You can find out more on the training on the events section of our website!

Cook 4 Life Harvest Celebration

Date of event: 15th September 2009
Organised by: NCVO
Venue: Offshoots Permaculture, Burnley
Report by: Rob Squires, Wellbeing Network Co-ordinator (Third Sector)

This was the third regional networking event that I have organised for Target: Wellbeing, the objective being to connect people accross the region doing work around healthy eating. The day followed the same format as the mental health and physial activity events in July, in that it was headlined by a talker from Government Office North West. On this occasion it was Angela Towers, who is the lead on Food and Health Issues at GONW, and also at the FSA (Food Standards Agency). Angela gave a fine presentation about the work of these two agencies, and how they support 3rd Sector projects such as those in Target: Wellbeing, as well as impressing upon the group, how vital the work of our projects are to regional healthy eating strategies. (A copy of Angela's presentation is available on request .. please email me.)

Angela's presentation was delivered in a yurt, which is a traditional Tibetan structure. The yurt was lined with straw bales, and was filled with 16 enthusiastic participants. These included three people from Making Local Food Work, which is a national infrastructure project supporting local food enterprises. One of these was Maressa Bossano, who supports the Food C0-ops programme, and traveled all the way from Hastings especially to see us!

With the approach of the autumn equinox, and the end of the growing season, the day also included a harvest celebration lunch, where participants brought along fruit from the land, and dishes made from ingredients from their projects. Following this was a fascinating tour of Offshoots Permaculture project by Phill Dewhurst. Offshoots is managed by Groundwork East Lancs, and is part of the Target: Wellbeing programme. It is a flagship project in Burnley, demonstrating many features of sustainable living, including food growing, community composting, compost toilets, renewable energy and sustainable building.

Follow up:
I am already planning a follow-up for this event, which will take place at Rice Lane City Farm in Liverpool next year. Making Local Food Work will headline this event, and the theme will be around social enterprise skills sharing for Target: Wellbeing food projects. The event will also be timed to co-incide with the lambing season, and participants will be able to get involved in this. A couple of days after the Harvest Celebration event at Offshoots, I visited Rice Lane, for a planning meeting with Roma Margret. At the same time I organised a three way meeting with Nicola Lee who is the director of food with Liverpool MBC. Both Nicola and I had a fascinating morning learning about the work of the farm, and meeting some of the rare livestock that are bred there.

In the Shadow

PART I - GUEST BLOG

Date of event: 9th September 2009
Organised by: NCVO
Venue: Groundwork Northwest
Report by: Mike Chambers, Head of Local Government Information and Analysis

It happened while I was on leave in August. While I was sunning myself in the mountains, Government Office was busily volunteering me for a day shadowing Rob Squires. I could have complained and, I guess, they could have apologised, but either of these would have been a first (honest!). But why complain? I have always been curious about the inside story of a cluster of projects delivering our vision for the North West.

It's not been what I expected. I don't know why but I was expecting brass tacks and lots of detail but instead I have spent the time looking at philosophy, ethics and the futures for the region's communities. I imagined we would occupy seperate worlds with different priorities and imperatives but in fact we have lots in common; not least the goals, frustrations and mysteries of health inequalities and life chances.

At the back of my mind is the haunting question of whether there will really be wider benefits than the joys of a mushroom melt lunch and some delightful chats with a collection of smart people. Well, there are. I hadn't appreciated that the mound of information we are sat on in Government Office could be useful to others, or the potential of Target: Wellbeing to give us a wealth of examples of initiatives to illustrate what can be done. So we will be extending our networks by looking at sharing information and analytical tools.

Its still only half time in the shadowing process. The second leg will be in Government Office next week. So watch this space.


PART II

Date of event: 16th September 2009
Organised by: NCVO
Venue: Government Office North West
Report by: Rob Squires, Wellbeing Network Co-ordinator (Third Sector)

It all began whilst everyone else at Target: Wellbeing was on holiday. In a quiet momment in the office I nonchalantly applied to a NCVO scheme called A Day In the Life, in which I would shadow somone in local government for a day, and in return they would shadow me. My reason for applying was that I wanted to discover what the human side of a government agency was like. When Mike arrived in our office last week, my first impressions of him were that he was very cool and confident. He also turned out to be quite fascinating, with a rich depth of experience, and a broad outlook on life.

During my afternoon in Government Office with Mike, we talked quite a lot about issues to do with data analysis and dissemination. He introduced me to his information and analysis manager, Mark Ellison, and we looked at some of the reporting formats they are developing for their data. They are keen to develop a closer partnership with Groundwork Northwest, and Target: Wellbeing as an outcome of A Day In the Life. Mark has offered to come into our office soon and give us some support in shaping up the evaluation data that we are getting from the 95 projects in Target: Wellbeing.

Blues Skies

Date of event: 15/07/09
Organised by: Target: Wellbeing Regional Support Network
Venue: Mansion House Active Age Centre, Age Concern Halton and St.Helens
Report by: Rob Squires, Network Co-ordinator - Third Sector

This was the second Target: Wellbeing networking event and this time the aim was to connect projects across the region that work on mental health issues.

The venue for the event was the stunning Age Concern Mansion House, located in Victoria Park outside St Helens town centre. The event was a trip down memory lane for me, as I used to work at the Mansion House as the gardener back in 1996. When I joined the Target: Wellbeing team I was intrigued to learn that the Trust Matters 50+ Counselling service is based there, and when I met Paul Chadwick who runs the project, I was very impressed with the work they are doing and was keen to visit the Mansion House again.

After the networking event I had a little look round, and was pleased to see that the house and gardens have maintained their splendour. Upon entering the kitchen gardens I was amazed to see that some willow snaps I had planted back in ’96 have grown into beautiful 30ft high trees.

Paul gave a great presentation about their counselling service, and told a really touching story about a client, who had been feeling suicidal until receiving services from Paul and his team, who put him back on track. The client told Paul that he had put the rope in his hands that saved his life, and that it was Paul's team that pulled him out of the hole. The client gave Paul a copy of a Fathers' Day card from his children, telling him how much they loved and appreciated him. He told Paul that without the help of Trust Matters he probably would not have been alive to this day, to receive the card.

Stories like this are the real stuff, and they cut straight through all the frustrations we feel, as we struggle to evidence the impact that Target: Wellbeing is having, and motivate us to carry on doing what we do.

In addition to Paul, there was a fascinating presentation from Jude Stansfield, Public Mental Health and Wellbeing lead with Government Office North West, who gave us the low down on policy issues in the region.

Amongst other things, Jude gave us a sneak preview of New Horizons from the Department of Health, which is a new vision and programme of work to improve the mental wellbeing of everyone, as well as continuing to improve the quality and accessibility of mental health services. It aims to address the inequalities that different groups in society experience, both in accessing services and in levels of mental health. It will set out the national direction from 2010.

Jude also told us about PROMiSE, which is a new third sector regional mental health network, being pulled together by Voluntary Sector North West and NHS North West, in order to link the sector in with the region’s Mental Health Improvement Programme. PROMiSE are having their launch event on September 7^th in Preston (see the VSNW website for more information), and they will be looking for representatives from the sector to sit on the MHIP’s steering and stakeholder boards. Target: wellbeing intends to put forward an applicant to this position, to make sure that mental health projects within our network have an influence within decision making in this area.

Jude also happened to drop into the conversation, that she has organised it for Target: Wellbeing to provide a workshop at the Northwest Wellbeing Conference 2009. This is a important event which will incorporate the 6^th annual Northwest Public Health Conference and the 17^th annual conference of the WHO Regions For Health Network. The theme of our workshop will be around ‘Lessons learned’. We are keen to involve projects in the delivery of this workshop and will be circulating more information soon. Thank you to Jude for pulling this workshop out of a bag, and giving us this opportunity to make an impression.

There were around 20 people at our networking event in all, representing different projects and programmes from across the region. I took the opportunity therefore, to run a workshop and get information from people about how we can strengthen the Target: Wellbeing network. I asked the same 4 questions as I did at the Running with the Times networking event, at the National Wildflower Centre, last week (see previous blog to see what these are). As with this event, I will be collating the information generated from Networking events, and producing a summary report later in the year.

Thanks to everybody that came to the Mansion House, you are all stars, and I look forward to seeing you at future events.

Running with the Times

Date of event: 08/07/09
Organised by: Target: Wellbeing Regional Support Network
Venue: National Wildflower Centre, Courthey Park, Knowsley (Landlife)
Report by: Rob Squires, Network Co-ordinator - Third Sector

This was the first in a series of networking events I am organising to connect people across the region involved in Target: Wellbeing. The event was attended by over a dozen workers from projects and programmes that focus or involve Physical Activity.

The event included a talk by Jackie Brennan, who is the Physical Activity lead for the Regional Department of Health team and Government Office North West. Amongst other things, Jackie talked about Be Active, Be Healthy, which is the national physical activity strategy, and how Target: Wellbeing projects contribute to this. In addition she talked about the importance of the regional Target: Wellbeing evaluation, and how the knowledge that projects are generating will help inform and shape policy in the region.

There was also a presentation and site tour by Jan Pell, who manages the Target: Wellbeing Great Outdoors project at the Wildflower Centre. She talked about the 'Natural Health System' and how connecting people with nature, and outdoor spaces, can improve their health and wellbeing. The National Wildflower Centre is playing a very positive role within the Knowsley Target: Wellbeing programme, and is acting as a hub, from which a number of the different projects are delivering activities. We are hoping that this natural collaboration can be built upon as the programme progresses.

I have copies of both Jackie and Jan's presentations and if you want them, then please email me here.

In addition, we ran a short workshop, asking the following four questions:
1. How can Target: Wellbeing partners contribute most effectively to regional strategy?
2. Where do projects need to be by the end of the Target: Wellbeing programme?
3. How can Target: Wellbeing projects, plus programme leads collaborate more closely in the future?
4. Who / what do you want from future Target: Wellbeing networking events?

I have written up the results of this workshop, and emailed them to those that participated in the workshop - if you were not there, but would like a copy, then please email me. I will be running a series of other networking events over the next few weeks, including Mental Health event next week, and Healthy Eating day in September, and will be running similar workshops during these. The information generated will be put together into a short summary report, that will be made available to all.

BREAKING NEWS - NHS NW Wellbeing Conference 2009

I have just received information on the NHS Northwest Wellbeing Conference 2009, which is focussing on Wellbeing and the economy, sustainable communities, and inequalities. All very topical at the moment it would seem!

The conference brings together the 6th annual Northwest Public Health conference, and the 17th annual conference of the WHO Regions for Health Network, so it will be a big do! This will be at the Midland Hotel in Manchester, November 9th and 10th. I am hoping that Target: Wellbeing projects will make an impact at this conference. More info on this can be got from Deborah.Littlewood@dh.gsi.gov.uk at Government Office North West.