After today’s session it really hit home how much we have given to the community through our 3 day workshop. After the first day everything seemed a little uncertain and up in the air without teaching benefits, but throughout the last 2 days the students confidence has grown.  Not just simply transferring our skills to the students, but fulfilling the students ambitions to learn skills to teach to others.

The reflection process of the workshop as a whole and the video production outcome were incredibly insightful. The workshop reflection displayed major benefits for the communities and students. The students, and I both understand that utilizing the technologies and resources available to them is important for bringing communities together and working sustainably. I’m amazed by how well the students picked up the skills and knowledge to plan, produce and edit a video. It gave me an unbelievable sense of achievement in the fact I played a part in the start of changing and adapting the lives of community members. Giving people the opportunity to develop and transfer the skills developed throughout the workshop to help empower the lives of community members.

Workshop members were keen to develop their skills throughout the 3 days, and I hope they are continue and develop their skills and display this through the use of the blogging tool, WordPress. This way people can understand their ideas for CMCs and their ideas and visions can be developed through the support of others.

Watching the videos at the beginning of the session made me feel so proud! Proud that within 2 days we had turned a group of people who shied away from contributing and responding to questions asked, to people who can worked well in a team to understand the benefits of learning skills to transfer to others and give them an opportunity to have a say through the power of expression. My main reason for partaking in this journey was to see what my knowledge and  skills can do to better someone else’s live, maybe not directly but indirectly through the transferring of skills.

The whole trip so far is a complete eye opener to how much so little can do to change other people’s lives…

The final day started in plenary session with a presentation of the videos produced the day before by the two production crews. I have to say here and now that I was blown away by both videos. Yes there were one or two technical weaknesses and glitches but the fact that the participants put these videos together in 6 hours, and that included an hour for the introduction to video presentation mentioned in my earlier blog and the collective mind mapping and story boarding, using Flip cameras (as useful as they are they are little more that mobile phone video cams and as such have their limitations. I will post both videos here shortly.

After the presentations I got them to break back into their production crews and gave them 20 minutes to reflect critically and accurately on both the end product (where they identified weaknesses and how this might be improved) and the production processes and their roles in those. What followed when we came back into plenary session provided us with evidence of their capacity to engage both individually and critically in some quite excellent critical thinking and reflection. I have asked them to post their evaluations on the Youth Development Voices blog (link posted earlier). The discussion moved into a general evaluation of the 3 day workshop and I asked all participating stakeholders to share their feedback. I am happy to report that everyone hailed the workshop as a great success – it seems that participants were energised and enthused to the extent that many wish to apply what they’ve learnt in the development of Community Media Centres in their communities. Of course the glow of exciting engagement can soon wane if not sustained and we are already exploring ways in which we can support their activities.

Both of the young editors had already posted their crew’s respective videos on YouTube and these were then linked to the Youth Development Voices blog. I will embed them on here presently for your enjoyment.

As we moved towards the close of the workshop and one final lunch together, my students facilitated some practical workshops on the use of WordPress; the use of Googledocs as a shared workspace to support distributed collaborative learning; and mash-ups – linking the blog with other social media such as Facebook and Twitter. In this way we managed to get the few remaining stragglers signed up to the blog and posting contributions. Obviously, some are more confident authors than others but we encourage all contributions as these workshops have been about Participatory Action Learning supporting the building of capacity; empowering the young participants and facilitating students and provide spaces and processes for diverse young voices.

Callum explains the finer points of blogging

All in all I am extremely happy about the way that this workshop has been facilitated by my students and engaged in by the participants. Their own blogs both here and on the Youth Developing Voices blog bear testament to the workshops effectiveness and overall success. I am extremely proud of my students who have been a major credit to themselves and to the University of Brighton. They have confirmed my faith in them and in this particular approach to teaching and learning – which blends pedagogy with andragogy and heutagogy approaches with participatory action learning and critical reflective thinking. By the same token, the participating students from a number of Kenyan universities and NGOs were equally a credit to themselves and their organisations. It was great to know that practitioners from UNDP programmes sat alongside students and a lecturer, a Dean and even a Principal (vice-chancellor) of a university engaging with such enthusiasm and creativity. I wish to thank Willice & Gordon from the International Youth Council Kenya for their organisation and dedication is ensuring the workshop went ahead. For a number of reasons it went through various iterations in the planning phase but they pulled it off and ensured it was a success.  The presence of Accord an agency for cooperation and research in development and their contributions throughout also helped stimulate and contextualise the significance of this workshop. The fact that they wish to explore possible future collaborations is a mark of the success of this workshop.

As we sat together for lunch the UNDP representative of a peace and reconciliation project in remotest rural Kenya approached me to discuss ways we might collaborate. This was swiftly followed by the Dean following up on yesterday’s discussions exploring how we might reach a Memorandum of Understanding.

All in all this has been quite an amazing 3 days. I have been surrounded by some extremely talented young people who have engaged in the workshop and who are determined to use their skills, knowledge and enthusiasm to make a difference and empower their communities. Quite, quite amazing…..I am truly humble to have been part of this workshop.

Participants of the Capacity Building Community Media PLW

The 2^nd day of the Community Media Capacity Building workshops became CMC Day for the participants. Community Media Centres provided the focus for the video training. In what was to prove to be an eventful day the students took the participants through an introduction to video, which included pre-production, production & post-production; different types of shots and angles and framing the shot.

I was taken off for a meeting with the Principal and Dean of a Kenyan university who are interested in developing a media studies partnership (practice and theory) with the University of Brighton and the students split the participants up into two production groups and started to go go through mind-mapping processes with them in order to generate the ideas for the story-boarding for the videos.

Mind-mapping and story-boarding with Laura

As the students continued to facilitate the participatory video training the Principle outlined his vision of setting up a community media centre facilitated by students and staff but designed to engaged with and support farmers, women’s groups, youth groups, HIV & drugs awareness outreach activities and much much more. He stated that he’d been impressed with the workshop and would like to enter into a Memorandum of Understanding in which staff and student exchanges from Media studies could be introduced and in which we could pursue joint research funding bids. There was an exciting exchange of ideas and hopes as to how this might be achieved and I will be bringing back my thoughts on the meeting and discussing them with my line managers before we proceed but next year’s student trip to Kenya might be another small step toward this exciting partnership.

On the down side I missed a concealed step, twisted my ankle which caused a significant amount of pain. I received a massage from a physio (which hurt like hell). After taking the pain killers and anti-inflammatories that I took (good risk assessment & H&S training) and resting it up all night….the swelling is reducing and whilst still painful…..I suspect all will be well in a couple of days. Right now however, I’m doing a pretty good impression of hop-a-long Cassidy ;-).

The rest of the afternoon proceeded through intensive video production training and the day came to a close with both teams having completed their videos. These will be shown in plenary in the morning and then posted to Vimeo with links posted on this site……enjoy.

Rosie & Fred watch the shoot

After todays workshop it really hit home how hard it is for lecturers to engage and get interaction amongst students in lectures. Giving a little motivation, I’ve noticed from today, goes a long way. The first day of the workshop displayed a hidden sense of enthusiasm as people seemed to be less inclinded to contribute through keeping thoughts to themselves. However, from today the students displayed a keen sense of interaction and communication between not only the teachers and students but amongst the students themselves. The willingness to learn and develop skills, knowledge and understanding for the media equipment and software was inevitably noticeable.

Putting together ideas and understanding for the pre production of the video allowed the students to show their ideas and collaborate effectively. The idea to produce a video production surrounding empowerment shown through the use of a community media centre (CMC) was cleverly thought out and developed into a storyboard. The team began to quickly get involved in shooting the video and sharing the responsibility of the different roles, allowing everyone to have an experience of each role.

The main aspect of the workshop so far is the benefits that can be seen that have been adapted to the ideas and aspirations that can be taken on after within their local communities. After speaking to the group I was working with today I am really looking forward to hearing the reflection on the workshop as a whole and how everyone, including us, have benfited. Bring on tomorrow!

Through the video production workshops that were held today, engagement between teachers and students began to take shape and grow. The morning began with myself, Rosie, and Callum introducing the students to procedures and techniques within video production, as well as setting the students tasks – such as producing mindmaps and story boards – so that they could start initial stages of producing their own documentary.

After software issues and difficulties yesterday, I felt that I lost any confidence that the students may have had in me, however I believe that I restored that confidence today when going through the video production handbook, and directing the procedures. I saw this confidence and comfort begin to grow when students would start asking questions about documentaries and engaging in dialogue. When watching the students carry out interviews for their documentaries in the afternoon, it was nice to see them coming out of their shells, creating realities out of their visions, sharing an enthusiasm, and using techniques that I had taught them. It felt good to be able to have confidence in the knowledge that I was sharing, and seeing the students understanding and applying it.

When myself, Rosie and Callum were speaking to a student on a tea break, he informed us that he wishes to share the knowledge that we taught him to empower those who have no knowledge of ICTs or social networking. If one person goes away from this workshop and teaches the skills to at least one other person, then I will be happy – although I do hope that they take it further!! 

Last day of teaching these students in this workshop tomorrow, so hopefully this positivity will continue!!

The first day at the workshop at Hillpark Hotel started with the participants getting into groups and sharing their ideas surrounding the notion of a community media centre (CMC). The group I was working with had broad ideas around the topic area and different ambitions in relation to contributing or setting up a CMC. The follow are a few questions deliberated through the CMC scenario… 

Q. What was you motivation to be involved in these three day workshops?

A. – Expand a company
– Networking
– learning from others
– Meet people in the media
– Share knowledge and skills
– Learn how to link and involve others through the use of community media
– To find out what community media is

Q. What does a community media centre (CMC) mean to you?

A. – A source of information
– Empowerment and skills
– Telling stories to create positive change
– Expand and teach all young children giving them power and a voice
– Access information easily
– Create links between CMCs and the government

Q. How might it benefit your community?

A. – Empower youth through the use of skills and sharing of ideas
– Sharing stories that give people the power of voice
– Create government interaction
– Share information about health that can reach communities in time
– Employment
– Community unity

Q. What resources would be needed to establish and sustain a CMC? How might these be aquired?

A. – Internet
– Personel to lead the centre
– Media equipment- camera, computers, office space
– finance to sustain the CMC
– Good PR- word of mouth

Aquired through…

-Sponsors
– Donations
– Community funding
– Fundraising
– Partnerships

As part of the workshop of the first day of teaching, we split the group up into three groups, took a group each, and asked them questions regarding community media centres (CMC). The questions and answers in the scenario based workshop were as followed….

Q. What was you motivation to be involved in these three day workshops?
A. – I want to know how to develop social, political, and financial sectors by interfacing media into the community.
     – I want to know how a graphic designer can use the media.
     – I want to know how PR can use the media to reach a range of people and improve communication.
    – I want to know how to create blogs, how to share ideas with other communities, different ways to capture information, how to make videos, and how to take photographs.  I also want to set up CMCs across the nation.
    – I want to learn how to mobilise the community, ensure that information gets passed, raise awareness of issues, learn new tools and networks to communicate.

Q. What does a community media centre (CMC) mean to you? How might it benefit your community?
A. – To have a CMC there needs to be a reciprocal exchange of reliable information and ideas. Community radio, television, different networks. To have a CMC you will need A – a physical location to engage and exchange in ideas, and B – Aid packaging information.
   – To have a CMC information needs to be accessed and shared, making it accessible to have debates and raise issues, to make voices to be heard at a national level.
  – CMC is a tool for civic engagement and campaigns. It gets information from centres, and utilises local media, not national media. IT also provides access to the internet.
   – A CMC is the mass media reaching out to people. It is the ears, eyes, and most importantly the mouth of the community. It voices out issues and needs to achieve maximum community potential.

Q. What resources would be needed to establish and sustain a CMC? How might these be aquired?
A. – The resources needed would be different types of resources, people as resources, material resources, volunteers, trainers in ICTs, people who can write. To have a CMC there also needs to be a library, documentation centre, a room, computers, videos, cameras, etc. To maintain the CMC there needs to be financial resources like sponsorships, material such as literature to educate people, and people need to have matching priorities in order to grow in the same direction.
   – The resources needed are the internet, computers, trainers, media / IT literacy, and the knowledge of how to integrate with technology.
   – We would need to establish how to mobilise and expose communities, make affordable and simpiler technology, and but more networks up in rural areas.
   – Technology needs to be affordable and accessible. There could be an educational summer camp with small charges, educational investments, and more tourist attraction. There could be a website to create awareness.