Resources and publications

Inclusive Practice in Action: Training with IVAR

A brilliant graphic from our Associate and Graphic Reporter Eddy Phillips, summarising the learning from our voice, access and inclusion training with the Institute for Voluntary Action Research staff and associate team.

Spheres of community influence

Our July 2024 report for Local Trust draws on in-depth case studies of eight community leaders in seven Big Local areas. It analyses the difference that community leadership training has made to how they worked in their areas and what they were able to achieve, both as part of a Big Local partnership and in their wider communities.

Building Community Leadership

The ‘Building Community Leadership’ report is the culmination of our work with IVAR as evaluation and learning partners to Local Trust’s Community Leadership Academy (CLA).

Learning from the experience of participants and delivery partners over the three years of the CLA programme, the report sheds light on how the CLA supported individuals in communities to take action during the difficult years of Covid-19, and what will be needed in future to take forward this learning and sustain community leadership.

One Pandemic, Many Reponses

This final report summarises learning from research over two years exploring how 26 communities across England responded to the Covid-19 crisis. We were part of the research team led by the Third Sector Research Centre (University of Birmingham) and Voluntary Action Research Group (Sheffield Hallam University) and commissioned by Local Trust.

Together we plan

We wrote this handbook drawing on research done for Local Trust from July to October 2020. Research looked at the experience of resident groups in Big Local areas and brought together examples of successful approaches to responding to personal and economic change caused by Covid-19. It remains relevant to community groups in reflecting on what has changed in communities; what has changed within community groups and how to make plans in uncertain times.

Re-thinking Home: Engaging Transient communities

We engaged with a range of Big Local resident led groups between January and March 2019 on this research into the experience of, and potential for, Big Locals to engage with ‘new’ or transient groups or communities in their areas. Our conclusions were designed to be relevant to supporting community groups with their efforts to engage transient and new communities in their area.