Page 56 - Barrow Town Deal Board Agenda 14/4/2020

Chapter Three: Community Researchers and the Research Process

A core component of the Connected Communities approach is to involve communities in research, to

develop an understanding of everyone’s needs. As you’re about to read, the Connected Communities
methodologies adopted in Cumbria differed slightly from the traditional approach, which historically
involves only adult members of the community, who often conduct community research in pairs or on

their own, in their own time. In addition to this traditional method, we recruited and trained children as

community researchers, and supported them in enacting their citizenship to provide opportunities to be
real agents of change. In order to do this in Ormsgill, local children were invited to participate through

Dropzone Youth Projects and the Mini-Police.

Community Survey

Young Community Researchers

This project ran from February 2019 to February 2020 and 24 children were successfully recruited, trained
and acted as young community researchers. The ages of the children ranged from 10 to 14 years old and

two thirds were girls (67%). The children were recruited by ulitising connections with two different non-
academic groups, Dropzone Youth Projects, a community youth group operating in Ormsgill, and the Mini-

Police, a community policing project which was delivered in partnership with Ormsgill Primary School.
Dropzone is a charity offering youth provision throughout the Barrow area, which includes universal

community based youth work and alternative education. Mini-Police is delivered within school time to a
small number of year 5 pupils who apply to be Mini-Police.

Workshops were held within existing Dropzone groups at Ormsgill Youth Centre to introduce the project

to young people. This provided opportunities for them to reflect on what they felt was important in their
community and also answer any questions about the project. Plans to do the same for the Mini-Police

unfortunately had to be cancelled due to a severe storm which prevented travel. However, the strong
relationship that Michelle (a local PCSO) had with the Mini-Police ensured that a majority of the young

people did become community researchers.

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