Achieving Community Empowerment (ACE)
National community capacity building programme
SCDC has been awarded over £400,000 from the BIG Lottery Fund to deliver the Achieving Community Empowerment (ACE) capacity building programme in Scotland. The programme aims to build the capacity of emerging community groups by providing mentoring support, developing learning materials, facilitating the sharing of knowledge, experience and learning between participating projects and communicating key lessons more widely. The programme will run for four and a half years and will directly benefit 50 groups across Scotland.
We will work with 10-12 groups per year to support them to assess the motivations and capacities of their own organisation, and those they seek to influence or work with. We will encourage groups to build awareness and support in their community, and to build the evidence to support the case for change. Such change may involve establishing community-run services or facilities; working with public agencies through community planning processes, or advocating through other means. This will be done through a series of structured workshops that focuses on the four key considerations in effective community action: assessment, planning, doing and reviewing. We will also develop a toolkit which draws on a range of good practice materials and ensure shared learning takes place with and between participants so that lessons learned can be shared across the statutory, voluntary and community sectors.
We are currently devising the systems and processes to identify eligible groups for the programme and expect to launch further details of the application process in the New Year. In the meantime, if you would like to express your interest and be added to our database to receive further detailed information, please contact Aileen Skillen on 0141 248 1924 or email aileen@scdc.org.uk.
The BIG Lottery Fund is funding two other capacity building programmes with other partner organisations under the Dynamic Inclusive Communities Fund. We will work closely with them to maximise the impact and learning of all three projects.
Our Community Our Future, delivered by the Scottish Community Foundation, is designed to provide support to a small number of new and emerging groups to develop their capacity to influence change within their community. For more information please visit http://www.scottishcf.org or register your interest with us and we will send you further details when available.
Forward Scotland will provide support to 150 new and existing groups under the 'Sus It Out +' programme. To help them develop and become more sustainable. For more information please visit http://forward-scotland.org.uk/
