Contents: Moda news (1); Events (6); Training (6); Calls (2); Resources (1); Funding (4); Jobs (4)
In response to interest from our groups MODA intends to set up a new forum:
Migrants' Anti-Poverty Alliance (MAPA). MAPA aims to bring together migrant
community organisations and stake holders interested in the issue and
consequences of poverty and unemployment experienced by migrant communities
and individuals.
MAPA aims to: 1. Monitor the level and size of poverty, destitution and unemployment among migrant communities and individuals through conducting research, surveys and case studies; 2. Create a forum for participants and stakeholders to exchange knowledge, experiences, ideas, resources and co-operate in finding solutions through developing shared strategies and projects; 3. Use the data obtained through research and shared strategies to influence policy-makers in relation to tackling migrants' poverty and unemployment; 4. Provide information, advice and training focusing on the promotion of employment, self-employment and social enterprise.
The project will work to achieve the above aims through: 1. Creating a forum of interested parties; 2. Developing research projects; 3. Holding bi-monthly meetings; 4. Developing proposals for fund-raising to support anti-poverty and employment measures for the benefit of migrant individuals and families; 5. Co-ordinating and co-operating with similar networks, organisations and agencies to influence policy-makers; 6. Providing information, advice and training.
MODA's MAPA network is open to all migrants, migrant community organisations, public bodies, businesses and other stakeholders interested in the promotion of employment and anti-poverty solutions to tackle poverty and destitution experienced by migrant families and individuals.
To register interest in joining this network please email info@moda.org.uk
Points-Based System: Can it really make labour migration work for Britain?
26th November, Garden Court Chambers, 57-60 Lincoln's Inn Fields, London WC2A 3LS
The AGM at 6pm will give JCWI (Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants) members to hear about JCWI's work and to meet with other members. The formal business will be followed by a seminar at 7pm which is open to both members and guests. The seminar will include contributions from 3 main speakers: Professor Eleonore Kofman (Gender, Migration and Citizenship at Middlesex University), Jeremy Oppenheim (Regional Director, UKBA), Keith Vaz MP (Chair, Home Affairs Committee) to be our key note speakers at the seminar.
For information contact: c.andreatta@migrantsrights.org.uk
10th December 2009, 14.00pm -17:30pm
Prospero House, 241 Borough High Street, London, SE1 1GA
Join the British Institute of Human Rights and the Equality and Human
Rights Commission on international human rights day for an insightful
event looking at the potential of human rights to tackle poverty and strengthen
public services in the UK.
This event will showcase the BIHR human rights based approach to poverty project. This pioneering programme of work - funded by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, City Parochial Foundation, Joseph Rowntree Foundation and Oxfam - is supporting six London based voluntary and community sector organisations who work with and for people facing poverty or social injustice to use a human rights based approach to strengthen their voice and influence with public sector policy makers.
The three key areas of public sector provision the project is looking at are: housing & homelessness, social services and healthcare. Drawing from learning in the project, the event will provide an opportunity to discuss the issues faced by people and communities experiencing poverty in relation to these three areas. It will also look at the potential of human rights to provide solutions to these issues - supporting the development of public services and policies where fairness, respect, equality and dignity are at the core.
For further information and to register for the event, please click here.
A full-day conference and exhibition
Tuesday 1 December 2009 ; 10.00am -4.00pm
The Old Town Hall Stratford, 29 The Broadway, London E15 4BQ
The London branch of the European Anti-Poverty Network England (EAPN), in partnership with the Third Sector European Network (TSEN) and LVSTC, is holding this event in anticipation of the forthcoming European Year Against Poverty (EY2010).
- Listen to our speakers, including Rt Hon Stephen Timms MP, Bharat Mehta, Chief Executive of the City Parochial Foundation and Jean Lambert MEP
- Visit our Exhibition, featuring just some of the anti-poverty work currently taking place in London
- Learn about grassroot level experiences of tackling inequality
- Discuss what shape the year could take and it could be used to help your work
We are keen to make this event as representative as possible, so we welcome bookings from organisations who help to tackle poverty and those who they have helped, in order to feed in their contributions and experiences as well.
For further information and to book a place click here or call LVSTC on 020 7538 4309.
03 December 2009, 14.30 – 17.30;
NCVO Conference Suite, 8 Regent's Wharf, 8 All Saints Street, London,
N1 9RL
This free event is run by NCVO and aimed at anyone in a policy and/or campaign role and is particularly suitable for networks, coalitions and alliances, or any organisation wishing to collaborate. Collaborative working is an efficient way of increasing the impact and effectiveness of campaigning and policy work. This seminar will feature a mix of presentations, discussions and practical exercises and will focus on: What collaboration means in a policy and campaigning context and how it can increase impact; Reviewing different ways of working collaboratively; Knowing when to collaborate and how to minimise risk.
For further details please contact Nicola Gilbert on 020 7520 2465 or
nicola.gilbert@ncvo-vol.org.uk
.To book a place click
here.
10.30 - 2pm November and December 2009
West London Refugee Women’s Forum in partnership with the Women’s Library, London Metropolitan University, and Central Foundation Girls’ School invites women from minority groups to join free workshops in Brent on 18th, 25th November, 2nd December, 9th December and 16th December. For further information please call WLRWF on 0208 970 2145 or email: wlrwf@yahoo.co.uk
8 December 2009, 4-5.30pm, Social Sciences Building, City University
Finding evidence about asylum seekers, refugees or migrants to put into funding proposals, policy papers or research proposals is often a fraught process with a lack of time being a major issue. There are a number of resources which can provide the key evidence needed quickly assuming that you know where to look. Led by experienced researchers Julie Gibbs and Gabriela Quevedo from the ICAR team, this seminar will show you where to find key information and how to access it.
This information will include: Statistics, Local Information, Previous Research, Policy and Official documents, Publications. The session will involve a demonstration of a number of key web resources and how to get the best from them these will include ICAR, Home Office, Office for National Statistics and others.
Who should attend? Fundraisers, researchers, policy officers and writers from voluntary and community organisations and statutory agencies that work with asylum seekers, refugees and migrants; students; and anyone who needs to find information easily and quickly.
This event is free of charge but places are limited so
please book early to avoid disappointment.
Fo further information and to book a place please contact:
Information Centre about Asylum and Refugees, Social Sciences Building,
City University, Whiskin Street, London, EC1V 0AX, Tel: 0207 040 4596
E-mail: icar@city.ac.uk Web: http://www.icar.org.uk
26 - 27 November 2009, City Forum, London
This LVSC course will examine the practical aspects of implementing equal opportunities in organisations. It will look at devising a strategy to encourage people along the road from understanding to ownership to action. It will introduce methods for promoting equal opportunities at work and challenging discrimination will also be considered.
For further information click here.
Don't know your LinkedIn from your Twitter? Wondering how Facebook
and MySpace can support your work? Or perhaps you're feeling overwhelmed
by the growth in enquieries from members and companies looking for for
employee volunteering opportunities? Then help is at hand through a
series of free training seminars and workshops, brought to you by Red
Foundation through the Modernising Volunteering programme.
Through the 'Fresh Training' programme we will be running a half day seminar to provide an introduction to working with social networks, aimed at volunteer support service workers who are thinking of or just starting to use these networks for volunteer recruitment and communication with their peers or members. Running alongside side this will a half day workshop for volunteer centre managers and other infrastructure bodies on how best to advise and support their member organisations to respond to the growth in enquiries from companies looking for employee volunteering opportunities.
For further information and a list of next dates and locations click here.
Friday 27 November 2009, 10am-1pm, London Rebuilding Society,
EC2A 4PE
Cost: £49 + VAT
An introduction to help you understand the challenges in reaching and
engaging with diverse communities in the UK. For more information and
to book a place click
here.
8 December 2009, London
This free Community Safety Advisory Services course is aimed at managers and practitioners who want to increase the effectiveness of their internal communication; improve their understanding of communications strategies; develop a clear, planned and proactive strategy for communicating their work. For more information visit www.csas.org.uk/Training
20 January or 26 January 2010, Stratford E15 - Cost: Free
The ‘Workforce: The Young Voice' report highlighted the views
of young people about what characteristics and behaviours they wanted
to see from their workforce. The intention of this training is to build
on this research by supporting young people from ‘hard to reach
communities’ to develop and deliver training for practitioners
on what young people want from practitioners, under the title of the
‘B Heard Project’. To prepare for this focus groups have
been held, and filmed, and the training follows on from this.
This one day training is developed and delivered by a group of young
people (16-19yrs old) as part of the CWDC Participation programme. Young
people from four different youth centres in London (Youth A.I.D. Lewisham,
Youth League – Dagenham, East London Somali Youth & Welfare
Centre and the Junior Muslim Circle) have come together to get the opinions
of their peers about what works (and what doesn’t) for Practitioners
wishing to engage effectively with young people. They have then put
together this exciting and innovative one day training course, which
they will deliver themselves.
Outcomes: The professionals receiving the training will gain by
being better trained and having more skills and becoming more confident
in working in a better way with young people from a wide range of different
backgrounds. Practitioner attending will become aware of the characteristics
which will allow to effective communication and engagement with young
people across cultural barriers, by ensuring that they can share Common
values.
Target group: Both new and experienced frontline practitioners working
with young people, who want to find out what the young people themselves
really think.
You can download and application form from: http://www.lecp.org.uk/training
For further information contact: LECP Training & Workforce Development,
4th Floor Solar House, 1-9 Romford Road, Stratford, London E15 4LJ
training@londoneastconnexions.co.uk
, Tel: 020-8536-3630, Fax: 020-8534-2830
Migrants Resource Centre, 24 Churton Street, London SW1V 2LP
Writing CV and cover letter workshop - Friday 27 November 2009,
1-3 pm
We will learn what it takes to write a good CV and Cover Letter. We
will look at examples and formats that will help us compile a CV and
do exercises to find the right formulations.
Interview techniques workshop - Friday 4 December 2009, 1-3 pm
We will explore the challenges of job interviews. We will train to answer
the most difficult questions and find out how to successfully perform
at an interview.
Crèche will be available. To register for a session, please contact Bianca Galluccio by email: bianca@migrants.org.uk or phone: 02078211273 ext.108
Calls - Positive Commissioning Experiences
The Social Enterprise Coalition is looking for examples of how commissioners
have used innovative ways to get greater value from their commissioning.
This could include the creation of new social enterprises, the use of
community benefit clauses, building capacity and user involvement.
The Coalition is part of the National Programme for Third Sector Commissioning Partnership. Their role within this initiative is to research good practice and develop detailed guidance on commissioning from social enterprises.
If you have had a positive commissioning experience and you would like to share your story, or you are a commissioner with a creative track record, please contact Ceri Jones at ceri.jones@socialenterprise.org.uk.
For more information, visit the Social Enterprise Coalition (click here).
Source: Social Enterprise Coalition, 12/11/09
Resources - Refugee Council’s RIES programme seeks RCO details for move-on pack
The Refugee Integration and Employment service provides advice for newly
granted refugees in London. Due to UKBA eligibility criteria, many individuals
with Leave to Remain are ineligible to access RIES services. Consequently
an advice pack, including RCO details, is being compiled to support people
unable to access the service. For more information and to be included
in the pack, please contact sam.crosby@refugeecouncil.org.uk
Resources - London directory of ESOL provision
NIACE and the Refugee Council create London directory of ESOL provision.
This project aims to create a directory of learning provision in London
that is open to newly arrived asylum seekers, and who are not eligible
to access LSC funding for ESOL in the first six months of their asylum
claim. If you provide learning for asylum seekers and would like your
details to be included please contact marina.koniotou@niace.org.uk.
For more information visit www.niace.org.uk/righttoavoice
Funding - Awards for All, now easier for all
On 2 November 2009, BIG Lottery introduced three key changes to the
Awards for All small grants programme.
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1. Following a review of the new programme that launched in April this year, and after assessing how applicants have been using the new application materials, we have made some small changes to make some of the questions, and the guidance notes clearer.
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2. We will be introducing a new guide to support groups during the application process. It fully explains our requirements of groups that have been offered a conditional grant, and should prove useful for deciding whether to apply to Awards for All in the first place.
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3. The third change, which will affect applicants the most, is the relaxation of the requirements for a referee. The application form will no longer ask for referee details to be included. Whilst we haven’t removed the requirement altogether – we may ask certain groups that we feel need a referee once we have looked at their application – it will make the initial application process quicker and easier for all.
Awards for All offers grants of between £300 and
£10,000 for projects that improve communities, and the lives of
people within them. It's for voluntary and community groups, schools and
health organisations, parish and town councils and is open for applications
now.
For more information call 0845 4 10 20 30 or go to www.awardsforall.org.uk/england
Funding - Changing Spaces: Ecominds
Closing date for medium bids (20,001 to £60,000): 8 January 2010/
Closing date for small bids (£0 to £20,000): 30 June
2010
Mind has received funds from the Big Lottery Fund to run a £7.5million grant scheme as part of the Changing Spaces environmental initiative over the next five years. The Ecominds programme, run by Mind, is for a range of groups who want to encourage people with experience of mental distress to get involved in environmental projects, such as improving open spaces and wildlife habitats, designing public art and recycling. Ecominds will help reduce the stigma surrounding mental distress and help create a society that treats people with experience of mental distress fairly, positively, and with respect. The programme will award grants of up to £250,000
For further information click here.
Funding - CARA Grants for Refugee Academics
CARA (Council for Assisting Refugee Academics) grants aim to enable refugee
academics achieve employment in the UK at a level commensurate with their
skills and experience in the long term. Grants can support refugee academics
to re-qualify in a range of professions in the UK such as teaching, academia,
engineering, law, the charity sector and medicine.
The next deadline for applications is 5pm, Friday 11 December 2009. Anyone who is interested in applying may contact CARA at info.cara@lsbu.ac.uk, tel. 0207 0201 0880 or click here.
Salary £65,000 - £70,000; Fixed-term to 31st March 2011;
Reference L/00287
Closing date for applications: Friday 27th November 2009.
Provisional interview date: Friday 11th December 2009.
This is a critical time for the Refugee Council. All of our operational contracts and grant agreements are up for tender in 2010/11. The Operations Director’s role will be to lead the Operations Directorate in developing new service models and ensuring that the Refugee Council submits bids that are innovative and price competitive, whilst providing excellent service to refugees and asylum seekers. The post-holder will also provide strong strategic leadership to the Operations Directorate in delivering a wide range of services to refugees and asylum seekers.
You will have extensive experience of strategic management of services. You will also have experience of delivering services to vulnerable and diverse client groups, and an understanding of the data and technical requirements for effective client-focussed service delivery.
For further information and an application pack click here.
Salary £28,772 ; Fixed-term to 30th November 2011; Reference
L/00286
Closing date for applications: 1st December 2009
Across England, hundreds of Refugee Community Organisations (RCOs) deliver
support and advice to refugees. Despite RCOs' success, almost all would
benefit from more support. This is where our Basis Project comes in.
Created through the support of the Big Lottery Fund, and delivered in
partnership with Refugee Action, the project will run for another two
and a half years. The aim is to enhance RCOs' financial sustainability,
their organisational capacity and their ability to deliver services
to clients. This is a new role, created to respond to the demand for
our services in London.
This key role will see you working closely with RCOs across London, and building links with funders and other second-tier service providers.
With each RCO you’ll assess their needs, agree a development plan and coordinate the delivery of the support they need, including providing consultancy-style advice. As an integral part of the Basis team, you’ll also work closely and flexibly with counterparts from other regions across England.
You have a background in providing advice on organisational development issues in the voluntary sector, and will have delivered training before. A natural self-starter and solid relationship builder, you’ll bring an understanding of areas such as fundraising, project development, organisational governance and financial management; and an understanding of the needs and workings of RCOs. This role may best suit someone who will thrive in an environment that is under development.
For further information and an application pack click here
Deadline for receipt of applications: Wednesday 9th December 2009
Migrants Rights Network is embarking on a new and exciting programme of activities in the New Year, and we are now looking for the right Project Officer to contribute to this work.
The Project Officer will be working on MRN’s new Communications Strategies Project, aimed at strengthening the capacity of migrant community organisations to communicate their perspectives, experiences and concerns. The project will work over a three-year period, in four UK regions, to support the presence of a migrant ‘voice’ in debates about immigration in the UK. It will work in partnership with regional organisations, to conduct a targeted programme of work aimed at building the capacity of local activists and organisations to communicate messages in support of migrants. It will also create an accessible online platform through which regional partners can develop their skills in communicating with one another and more widely.
The Project Officer, a full-time (35 hour per week) position, will have specific responsibility for designing and launching a beta version website, with the capacity to manage multimedia and user-generated contents. The contract will be for a 6-month period beginning in January 2010, with a possibility for extension thereafter.
For further information click here.
