{"id":1094,"date":"2023-06-09T14:45:28","date_gmt":"2023-06-09T13:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/research.reading.ac.uk\/food-systems-equality\/?p=1094"},"modified":"2023-06-09T14:47:39","modified_gmt":"2023-06-09T13:47:39","slug":"brighton-hove-community-researchers-their-journey-of-learning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/research.reading.ac.uk\/food-systems-equality\/brighton-hove-community-researchers-their-journey-of-learning\/","title":{"rendered":"Brighton & Hove Community Researchers: Their journey of learning"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sharing Our Experiences as Community Researchers<\/strong><\/p>\n

Amanda Lucas, Sara Fernee \u2013 Community Researchers at the Brighton and Hove Food Partnership (BHFP)<\/p>\n

In this blog\u00a0 we aim to share our journey as Community Researchers: see our previous blogs\u00a0 <\/strong>What is the FoodSEqual project?<\/strong><\/a> and <\/strong>What we have learnt so far.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is a Community Researcher?\u201d<\/strong> and \u201cWhat is the FoodSEqual Project?\u201d <\/strong>are questions we are often asked when we tell people about our work with BHFP.\u00a0 It\u2019s a challenge to explain succinctly what FoodSEqual is and how we go about finding out about peoples\u2019 food realities and challenges<\/strong>, but we are getting lots of practice!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

FoodSEqual (Food Systems Equality Project<\/a>) is working towards \u2018Co-production of healthy, sustainable food systems for disadvantaged communities<\/em>.\u2019 There are 4 areas of the UK where local citizens are taking part in this 5 year project, Brighton and Hove, Tower Hamlets, Reading and Plymouth. FoodSEqual involves people from academia, business, government, not for profits and citizens (communities). \u00a0Finding a common language isn’t always easy. Community Researchers need to bridge the gap between our communities and our project partners.<\/p>\n

We researchers have different backgrounds and community connections in Brighton and Hove, often based around the City\u2019s Community Shops<\/a>.\u00a0 This gives us an excellent grounding for engaging and listening to local people.<\/p>\n

The journey\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

We took part in a wide range of training covering relevant academic methods and concepts and community development work basics (e.g. safeguarding and boundaries). Our first task was a collaborative one; to make 2 videos about local community gardens \u2013 you can see them here:<\/p>\n

Albion Community Garden video<\/a><\/p>\n

Bevendean Community Garden video<\/a><\/p>\n

This activity helped us start thinking about what a \u2018community\u2019 is, and how our own experiences values and assumptions affect our idea of this. Our work commenced as we were emerging post Covid-19, remote working made it harder to get to know each other but this collaborative task helped.<\/p>\n

The surveying <\/strong>task for \u2018Flavour Project\u2019<\/a> introduced us to devising a questionnaire and gave us our first taste of meeting people in a community setting. We all really enjoyed being part of the design process, learning about survey bias and engaging with people in real life.<\/p>\n

Then we moved onto our first lot of community food workshops\/focus groups<\/strong>. We worked closely with the academics at University of Sussex (who partly designed the workshops), to make sure that the workshops were appropriate for our areas. The aim of the workshops was to find out what people are currently cooking and eating, and what types of things they consider when making food choices. We then used the data from the workshop to\u00a0 learn and implement a research technique called \u2018thematic analysis\u2019 . We learned that fish and \u2018beans and pulses\u2019<\/strong> are two food groups that people would like to eat more in Brighton Hove. Being part of the \u2018research cycle\u2019 from beginning to end was invaluable to our progression and confidence in Community Research.<\/p>\n

The next research skill we learnt was called \u2018Participant Observation\u2019<\/strong> and we were privileged to be invited to Rock Farm during some community visits<\/a> to put these research skills into practice. We looked at people\u2019s interaction with space and activities of the day, took notes, discussed our thoughts as a team afterwards and fed back the information to stakeholders.<\/p>\n

Periodically, we embarked upon visits <\/strong>to meet colleagues and project partners at Reading and Tower Hamlets giving us a greater sense of our role in the project and have vital community research is to its success.<\/p>\n

Sara: \u201cOur trips to London by train to meet with other research teams on the FoodSEqual project really helped us get to know each other better, enabling us to gain a deeper understanding of food systems and to challenge each other about assumptions and expectations<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Photo 1:FoodSequal team day workshop in the Community Kitchen in Brighton<\/p>\n

Photo 2 \u00a0Watney St Market visit<\/p>\n

Leading Community Workshops<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The latest workshops about Fish, and Beans & Pulses have allowed us to take a more leading role alongside project coordinators, growing our confidence and putting our skills and training to the test. At one location we engaged an interpreter as the majority of the group spoke Bengali. This was both challenging as we needed to adapt our pace, and rewarding, as it ensured the group could fully understand our questions and freely discuss their ideas.<\/p>\n

Overall<\/strong><\/p>\n

We have learnt a lot and developed trust within our team, the wider research team and our communities\u2013 We have the confidence to say \u2013 \u201care we asking the right questions?\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0 and \u201cwe heard (our community) say this\u201d<\/strong> and \u201ccan we check that we know what you mean?\u201d\u00a0<\/strong> We can now advocate for our communities, know the best times and locations to engage people and identify and adapt when we don\u2019t think people have understood. Our growing confidence enables us to examine how to be more useful as community researchers and have<\/strong> faith that the voices of the communities we care about are being heard.<\/p>\n

————————————————————————————————————————–<\/p>\n

To receive occasional updates on the FoodSEqual project and here about opportunities to be involved in the workshops or other research activities \u00a0sign up for the mailing list<\/a> or contact:<\/p>\n

Shelley@bhfood.org.uk<\/strong><\/a>,\u00a007935481677\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Website<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0<\/strong>Newsletter\u00a0<\/strong><\/a>|\u00a0<\/strong>Twitter<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0<\/strong>Facebook<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0<\/strong>Instagram<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sharing Our Experiences as Community Researchers Amanda Lucas, Sara Fernee \u2013 Community Researchers at the Brighton and Hove Food Partnership (BHFP) In this blog\u00a0 we aim to share our journey…Read More ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":523,"featured_media":1095,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"__cvm_playback_settings":[],"__cvm_video_id":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9,8],"tags":[],"coauthors":[17],"class_list":["post-1094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","category-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"yoast_head":"\nBrighton & Hove Community Researchers: Their journey of learning - 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