2. What Was the Problem?
• A local community was highlighted as one that was
suffering from various issues and problems related to
health, wellbeing and education. A problem had been
identified that there was little point teaching children
about things like healthy eating if the parents weren't in a
position to implement the learnings and funding had been
gained specifically to try and tackle this problem.
• The project had been run by one of the local mothers but
had run into problems with the funding because the
activities were not felt to be educational and the funding
was being used to provide a creche for the children rather
than for families to take part in activities together.
21/04/2014 copyright Melanie Newdick
3. What Did I Do?
• Initially I met with the local primary school and got agreement to
operate the activities in the school itself, ensuring a better link
between school, parents and learning. I scoped out a program of
activities and learning for the year. The program linked together
with one session building on another and with several sessions in a
"treats" throughout the year to make sure it didn't become too
heavy. I operated the program, leading some of the sessions. I also
set up a community library in the school and arranged for the
mobile library to visit the school regularly as we discovered through
the project that many of the children rarely visited the local library
due to the distance involved.
• However, the project hit a plateau. Parent were very resistant to
learning with their children - they were happy for the children to
learn/do activities on their own.
21/04/2014 copyright Melanie Newdick
4. What Did I Achieve?
• The project was brought back to operate within
it's funding guidelines.
• I built up a great relationship with the local
school and helped the children gain more access
to books.
• When I felt the project couldn't make any further
progress it was stopped allowing the rest of the
funding to be reallocated.
• I used the learning from this project when I drew
up plans for another community project several
years later.
21/04/2014 copyright Melanie Newdick