Playground is at once both a shared ground for the exchange of ideas, and a space in which both existing and new ideas can be played with, their meanings and possibilities examined and explored. We will explore lessons arising out of work to date by collaborators and guests, and consider their potential to inform future ways of working.
Playground brings together both University of Plymouth staff and students active in civic-based learning and development, alongside a wide range of similarly-minded external partners.
Playground will operate as a series of lunchtime events, in which invited contributors will prompt and participate in a dialogue about their practice with other players in the room. Attendees are asked to bring their own lunch; tea/coffee and water/juice will be provided.
Playground is part of the Urban Dialogues Network.
All Playground sessions are held in The Sustainability Hub (Kirkby Lodge).
play ‘Play is finding expression; it is letting us understand the world and, through that understanding, challenging the establishment, leading for knowledge, and creating new ties or breaking old ones.’ (Sicart, M. (2014) Play Matters. Cambridge: MIT Press, p. 18)
ground 1) An area used for a specified purpose 2) An area of knowledge or subject of discussion or thought 3) Factors forming a basis for action or the justification for a belief. Oxford Dictionaries (2018) ‘Ground’, available online at https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/ground (Accessed 11.09.18)
Spring 2022
Please join us for the upcoming dialogues as part of the Urban Dialogues Playground Series.
This spring's series engages with a number of our external partners who advance civically-engaged learning projects in China, Malaysia and Sudan.
All Playground sessions are on Wednesdays from 1:00–2:00 and will be available via Zoom, passcode: 401996.
November’s Urban Dialogues Playground warmly welcomed Wendy Smith MBE and Andrew Dean of Well Connected; a Plymouth-based charity that was founded to establish outreach projects focusing on oral health and wellbeing. Wendy and Andrew talked through Well Connected’s aim to inform, inspire and innovate for the purposes of wellbeing for everybody.
They gave examples of projects such as ‘The Listening Project’ and ‘City of Smiles’ that foreground listening to the stories of local communities, focusing on kindness, caring and empathy in the co-creation of projects that have a broad reach and holistic approach to wellbeing. Well Connected then seeks to use this place-based expertise to inspire students and communities leading to impactful, award-winning initiatives (The Dental Awards 2021 Winner - Best Charity Initiative).
During the COVID-19 pandemic ‘The Listening Project’ heard ways in which people who had experienced disadvantage or marginalisation had adapted and developed resilience, this helped inform a workshop to help students returning to study after the pandemic on how to build resilience. Other key themes that emerged from these conversations was the importance of creative practices to deal with some of the issues people are facing and the need for outside space to connect with nature and to encourage greater wellbeing.
Hannah Sloggett (Nudge Community Builders) raised the need to keep in mind who benefits from any proposed interventions locally, asking how projects can generate value that can be passed on through generations and add value locally in a space at risk of gentrification. One instance of this is land ownership, how can local people make their own space and do great things locally in the existing neglected buildings? How can we facilitate this?
Both Richard and Hannah believe opportunity lies in collaboration, specifically practical collaboration – doing things and making things happen on the ground in turn, drawing out small but tangible benefits.
Roger Pike of the Milfields Trust raised the need to provide quality housing – providing a good stable home is vital. At the same time, wealth needs to be transferred through ownership of homes with a long-term view of turning around a community. He would also like to see investment into the local primary schools, a cornerstone for lifting families and an overarching shift to social enterprise and inclusive growth whilst protecting what the community already has. A new form of communication needs to be in place to collaborate better from the bottom up in order to fight structural inequality.
The three ‘Connecting the Dots’ Playground sessions have brought to the fore the deeply complex and entangled issues the Stonehouse community face. Contributors to these discussions have some great experience in pulling together with the community to draw upon and seek to make new opportunities for working together across sectors and ask some tough questions that won’t be answered overnight. How can city leadership begin to foster collaboration? How do people get to the table to be a part of these conversations? What can we contribute? What can we commit to the community in a process of building trust and for making more things happen or them?
At the third ‘Connecting the Dots’ meeting, Dr Richard Ayers (lead for Population Health for Plymouth Peninsula Schools of Medicine and Dentistry), discussed how the global pandemic exacerbated key challenges facing the Stonehouse community’s existing inequalities – with many people afraid to leave homes.
Also of concern is the rise in digital inequity being made more visible through his work in the community. More and more processes and access to healthcare is predicated by digital access – making evident a need for increased fluency of digital technology and digital equity going forward.
Filmmakers and lecturers Dan Paolantonio and Dr Allister Gall have been present in Stonehouse community for over ten years, building long-standing engagement with the community through film making and screening, reactivating areas to be re-popularised, and a forging a new creative cultural centre that serves intergenerational needs. These creative processes encourage storytelling – urging all to pick up a camera and tell their story and articulate their own points of views, perspectives, issues and challenges.
During one such event, Dan and Al screened archival film of the Stonehouse area and in turn people started sharing wonderful memories of these same spaces through the years. This event led to a collective walk around the environments and people were re-inhabiting the spaces and talking about them in a free and open exchange. Rooted in the place and in time, the community talked about fantastic things, aspirational conversations that made everyone there feel positive about the future here.
Such creative exchanges are taking place in the street, a shared space for collaboration and dialogue capturing and celebrating the knowledge and stories of the community. Provoking, encouraging, facilitating and mutually learning from one another.
During this meeting, possible future projects began to emerge. Josanne Stewart of Millfields Inspired, drawing upon her work with schools in the area and children thinking about work in relation to the archival film Dan and Al were sharing. The possibility of a collaborative ‘Stonehouse Workplace’ workshop was discussed and how the history of the work in the area has developed over the years through archival film.
Similarly, Rosie Brenman of the UoP Law Clinic has been in communication with Nudge Community Builders about co-producing a facilitation space for helping the community with their needs. Also recognising a potential overlap of this space with creative opportunities, a hub that facilities the serious and the playful in the community.
The dialogue continues and areas of common interest are beginning to emerge as potential focus areas for even greater collaboration and community engagement.
At the second ‘Connecting the Dots’ meeting attendees were prompted by the question: how can we co-create community engaged learning and sustainable civic development through compassionate dialogue?
In previous weeks, we have brought to the table our layered and increasingly overlapping interdisciplinary work, sharing best practices that equally serve the needs of community partners, engaged student learning and sustainable civic development. What has become evident is the value we all place on the partnerships forged between the University and community through the creation of shared experiences in shared spaces.
Dr Richard Ayers talked us through his research and observations as a practicing GP in Adelaide Street Surgery, Stonehouse, the most deprived ward in the city.
Richard shared insights into the inverse care law, a policy that restricts care in relation to need; this has resulted in areas such as Stonehouse having a stark mismatch between need and resource with insufficient time to truly manage patient problems – something outlined in the Deep End analogy/ project. In response to the above, Adelaide Street Surgery now runs outreach services to the homeless in the city.
Hannah Sloggett lives in Stonehouse and has volunteered in the community for over ten years. With a background in community engagement and regeneration, Hannah co-founded Nudge Community Builders, a group of local people that grow and build their community through incremental ‘nudges’.
Hannah shared a wide range of projects that began with a street party that has grown into creating several direct and immediate spaces of support and services for local people. Over time, Nudge Community Builders has regenerated Union Corner, the Clipper, accommodation for single parents, a community Café, the Plot, the Millennium building, and a recurring street market.
Dr Allister Gall shared his socially engaged community film practices, which have most recently been centred in Stonehouse. The project engages local people as participant filmmakers and elevates their voices through filmmaking workshops, screenings and performances in a shared screening environment.
Roger Pipe of the Millfields Trust and Professor Robert Brown discussed community engaged design and the development of a community hub in Stonehouse. Through joined up thinking and on-going dialogue, projects undertaken by the Master of Architecture student’s research are revealing the long-term impact of climate change on the built environment of Stonehouse.
A particular focus being rising sea levels prompting a need for long term planning in today’s propositions. A range of projects between the Master of Architecture students and BA Architecture Year 1 students have embedded local narratives, at various scales, into a range of proposals from an outdoor learning environment for local school to the regeneration of wider urban areas.
Dr Richard Ayers (lead for Population Health for Plymouth Peninsula Schools of Medicine and Dentistry), Hannah Sloggett (Nudge Community Builders), Dr Allister Gall (Film and Imperfect Cinema), Roger Pipe (Millfields Trust) and Professor Robert Brown (Architecture) came together online to share their work rooted in the community, history and urban fabric of the Stonehouse Neighbourhood of Plymouth.
It is hoped, by coming together, we can begin to share ways of tackling issues of deprivation through community based, joined up thinking.
Alice's presentation put forward some challenging and sobering insights about the state of health of Plymouth's population; alarming were the significant disparities in both life expectancy (including differences of up to 10 years) and obesity in the population as one moves through various areas of the city. At the same time, conditions prompt students to rise up to the challenge in terms of not only their own learning but also their professional ambition(s).
A number of key considerations came out of both the presentation and the discussion that intertwined Alice's talk:
Dr Alice Inman (Global Health) gave a well-received introduction to her work with the MSc Global Health students and local health practitioners, generating a lively discussion amongst attendees.
Grounded in her work with students within forum-based theatre, which activates the spectator as both provocateur and actor in the performance, Alex has with her students been active in supporting St. Luke's work with local schools exploring our understanding of loss.
Alex was joined in her presentation by Robyn Newport from St. Luke's, and Ryan Wilce (a former student). The work raised consideration of how we can be both proactive and empathetic in exploring sensitive issues with a wider audience.
Equally central to Alex's talk was a challenge she set out at the beginning, asking us to consider just how civic we are in our engagement.
Central to this was an interrogation of the phrase knowledge transfer, and the posing of knowledge exchange as a more balanced and mutually affirming alternative.
This prompt helped to raise a probing discussion on the nature of our civic commitment, both within our University-based disciplines and for the University as a whole.
Dr Alex Cahill (Theatre and Performance) gave both a challenging and inspiring talk exploring both the general nature of our civic engagement, and her particular work with St. Luke's Hospice and local schools.
With the recent successful launch of the UK's National Marine Park here in Plymouth, Alun explored the city's engagement with the water that surrounds it on three sides.
Crucial in his discussion was the potential of the ocean as capital – not in an economic sense (and thus possibly subject to exploitation) – but rather in more of a cultural, ecological and social sense and how the water can be understood as a resource from which all can benefit while fostering a greater sense of place attachment.
Key themes considered included:
Dr Alun Morgan (Education) gave an insightful and impassioned talk under the title of 'Ocean City - Ocean Capital?'
As part of his outreach, James has faced a daunting task; how to take a subject like history, which is too often taken for granted or even disregarded, and transform it into something in which people will be interested.
Taking in books, live presentations and television, James has indeed made history entertaining. This success has carried over into work with local schools, Yet aside from the quite visible success, there are equally a number of key lessons that have been learned.
There is great value in making things visible, including the use of theatre-like representations (whether literally or not) to achieve this.
Professor James Daybell (History/The Arts Institute) gave an entertaining presentation on the entertaining presentations he has been giving under the theme of 'Histories of the Unexpected'.
The Fresh Air project in Uganda has helped local villages through making medical information more accessible to a non-English speaking audience, while supporting medical outreach initiatives.
It is impressive body of work that John and his students have achieved in a short time. Was is surprising is that the relatively short timetable within which some of this work has been generated. Starting with a four-week group project, students team up to work with on live projects with local, typically non-profit partners. Students then spend the rest of the semester either continuing to work in a team or working on their own, further refining both the project brief and the proposition itself.
In addition to all the success achieved, there have been some important lessons learned from these projects. These include:
A final challenge is that owing to the discursiveness of the work pursued by students within any one module requires a diligence in keeping track of the progress of students’ work, and interaction with a number of disparate external partners, across a range of projects.
John Kilburn, a lecturer in Illustration, together with some of his students and external partners in the audience, provided a presentation on his high profile A Suitcase Full of Eels project, along with a review of of his other ecologically minded-work with illustration students.
Ranging from bikes to eels to lungs, John’s low-key approach has achieved significant impact, from not only the local level but also through informing international debate.
His students’ work for Bikespace in Plymouth has helped to support local enterprise, while enabling the crossing over of social and economic boundaries. The Suitcase Full of Eels project has brought attention to the critically endangered European eel, resulting in a trip to and exhibition of student work at the European Parliament in Brussels.
The range and extent of the law school’s commitment to supporting Plymouth residents is impressive, which includes: client-facing clinics (i.e.family law, employment law, welfare tribunal, and refugee family reunion clinics); partnership and interdisciplinary work (i.e. the MedLaw project with the medical school, Wolferstans and Foot Anstey solicitors; and partnerships with the British Red Cross, Citizens Advice and Shelter); and teaching, legal and community research (i.e. International humanitarian law project with Devonport High School for Girls, the street law project, and the crime law in history project).
Some very constructive insights were raised in discussion, noting both the laudable achievements of this work and some very real challenges faced:
Rosie Brennan, Sarah Guy and Julie Thompson (Law)
Rosie, Sarah and Julie, together with some of their students and external partners including from the British Red Cross and Plymouth Community Homes, provided a presentation on their awarding winning law clinic and external outreach with Devonport High School for Girls in Plymouth.
Both projects have been a success, with Year 3 BA Early Childhood Studies students supporting Year 1 BA Architecture students in consulting with the children at these nurseries, and providing insights on early childhood learning to the architecture students as they developed designs for new outdoor play/learning spaces at the nurseries. The architecture students then went on to construct these new spaces as part of their course work.
The discussion the presentation prompted was probing, and revealed some useful and at times challenging observations including:
Toshiko Terazono (Architecture) and Dr Karen Wickett (Early Childhood Studies)
Toshiko and Karen, together with some of their students and Brian Lee (former headteacher at Ham Drive Nursery) provided a presentation on their work at Ham Drive Nursery and Riverside Nursery in Plymouth.
Urban Dialogues Network website launch
Our new website launched on Thursday 6 December.
Urban Dialogues start-up get-together
Wednesday 28 February, 13.15–14.00, Room 207, Roland Levinsky Building
There was the opportunity to join us for a short discussion, alongside tea, coffee and cake, to hear about where we were so far, the support already in place, and the next steps in taking this initiative forward.
Urban Dialogues Network launch
Thursday 19 April, 16.30–18.00 Room 206–207 Roland Levinsky Building
This event celebrated our ambitions and gave us the opportunity to discuss both the potential and challenges of our agenda. We were joined on the evening by our guest speakers who included:
