Policies
Indicators
Number of cooperation agreements with CITY stakeholders
Number of awareness raising events targeting CITY stakeholders
Description
At this stage, resilience has not formally been introduced to educational programmes yet. This policy supports public understanding and acceptance of the concept of resilience through education.
Case Studies
Glasgow: Community Resilience Development Officer
Summary
A national role was created for a Community Resilience Development Officer. The role was intended to help ensure resilience thinking reaches schools and children.The Officer was to encourage a consistent approach across teachers across the country in this area and to share best practice by getting teachers together and to let them know about all the tools and approaches that are available to them.
Further information
Relevant City Context
This case study is of interest to all cities whether they wish to consider the full case study or to adopt something on a smaller scale. Although the work was funded at a national level by the Scottish Government, a city could undertake something similar on a smaller level by having a reduced resource but still focusses on liaising with the City Education service. Children are the future of the city, so getting them engaged at an early age is important. Children can also be a key route in engaging parents.
Goal
Help with (L3M1) Promote a culture of resilience through increasing citizens awareness of resilience by (P2A3) developing education programs in schools about resilience
In Glasgow there is a great diversity of understanding of the term “resilience”, ranging from very simple conceptualisations to those which are extremely complex. The project was designed to create better understanding nationally (Scotland) across school age children (age 11-17) about issues of community preparedness as well as to prompt teaching staff to design exercises to build skills in relation to community resilience and action.
The plan was to liaise nationally with schools and produce a defined outcome around resilience. This depended upon enhancing teachers understanding of resilience and so encouraging their schoolchildren to do activities around resilience. The focus was mainly on being prepared in case of emergencies as it was felt there was not sufficient prominence placed on this through the national Curriculum for Excellence in schools. However the scope did touch on wider resilience issues such as self-esteem, community empowerment and mental health.
A full-time position was created, the Educational Officer, to encourage a consistent approach across teachers across the country in this area and to share best practice by getting teachers together and to let them know about all the tools and approaches that are available to them.
Evaluation of Outcome
The impact of that Community Resilience Development Officer role on adult stakeholders was evaluated in 2017 by an independent organisation - The James Hutton Institute - using qualitative and quantitative data. The full project has been evaluated:
http://www.readyscotland.org/media/1390/crew_community-resilience-officer-evaluation-final.pdf
It was felt that schools were engaged with the process and thus wanted to keep this momentum up and not lose the initial enthusiasm. Therefore recommendations included keeping the post going beyond the 2 years and also focussing on how children can be proactive as well as reactive.
Resources
The Scottish Government funded full-time two year Community Resilience Development Officer role based in Education Scotland to co-ordinate communications and actions on a national level. The role was intended to help embed resilience thinking and online resources within the Curriculum for Excellence, i.e.to ensure resilience thinking reaches schools and children. A reduced role could be considered on a smaller scale to start the process.
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This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 653569.