The sweet smell of solutions Don't let anyone tell you that community solutions have to be dressed up with the novelty bow tie of the third section. Sometimes they can smell of lavender.
For now at least see this image of The Front Yard Company's Plant Locks in action as a visual metaphor in a city full of bicycles. Most of Oxford's cyclists have struggled to find secure bike parking in a city that's too often described as "a bicycle grave yard". Here's to social enterprise solutions.
Plant Locks are familiar to the people of London. They're springing up in inner city schools throughout the capital, and the good news is they're traveling.
Oxford Cycle Workshop Training is now using them as part of enterprise projects with local schools. At Iffley Mead School in Oxford students successfully marketed the idea of installing one on their school site to their headmaster.
So really it's Oxford Cycle Workshop Training that's smelling of lavender in this story. They are a community owned co-operative organisation take a social enterprise approach to tackling the cities problems, some of which you'd more often expect to be tackled by the third sector. Their projects work to take class room engagement out into their city and the sustainable real world for students already struggling to connect with curriculum based education. They offer the young people they work with a share in the organisation, and a role. Young people are encouraged to support trainers in teaching lessons they have attended, take up volunteering roles and get active with partner clubs and activities.
This is just one of many projects successful in gaining support for offering a community share on a government funded research project over the next twelve months. The project explores new models for social enterprises to engage their communities not only through volunteering opportunities, but also in investment and ownership. This offers communities an alternative to the third sector, with an approach that is all about empowering communities rather than just patronising them with spoon fed solutions.
Details of all the projects receiving Community Shares support can be found here.
For now at least see this image of The Front Yard Company's Plant Locks in action as a visual metaphor in a city full of bicycles. Most of Oxford's cyclists have struggled to find secure bike parking in a city that's too often described as "a bicycle grave yard". Here's to social enterprise solutions.
Plant Locks are familiar to the people of London. They're springing up in inner city schools throughout the capital, and the good news is they're traveling.
Oxford Cycle Workshop Training is now using them as part of enterprise projects with local schools. At Iffley Mead School in Oxford students successfully marketed the idea of installing one on their school site to their headmaster.
So really it's Oxford Cycle Workshop Training that's smelling of lavender in this story. They are a community owned co-operative organisation take a social enterprise approach to tackling the cities problems, some of which you'd more often expect to be tackled by the third sector. Their projects work to take class room engagement out into their city and the sustainable real world for students already struggling to connect with curriculum based education. They offer the young people they work with a share in the organisation, and a role. Young people are encouraged to support trainers in teaching lessons they have attended, take up volunteering roles and get active with partner clubs and activities.
This is just one of many projects successful in gaining support for offering a community share on a government funded research project over the next twelve months. The project explores new models for social enterprises to engage their communities not only through volunteering opportunities, but also in investment and ownership. This offers communities an alternative to the third sector, with an approach that is all about empowering communities rather than just patronising them with spoon fed solutions.
Details of all the projects receiving Community Shares support can be found here.
