The upskilling of local people in building bridges of trust across a diverse community is one of the aims of the Hope in the Cities Dialogue Group in Nottingham. In October 2008 they held a four-day training course at the Sycamore Community Centre on how to facilitate community dialogues.
Participants were from a wide range of communities, ages and genders—African-Caribbean, British Moslem from the Asian community, African refugee and from the host community. Phoebe Gill and Denzil Nurse from Hope in the Cities took everyone through a series of stages in the learning process.
Some key elements were: Understanding how co-facilitation works; How to listen sensitively, for the feelings behind what participants were saying; How to carry out an Environmental Scan; How to prepare appropriate questions; How to ensure outcomes are generated collectively by the participants—not imposed in any way by the facilitator.
A challenging final day enabled pairs of participants to run 45-minute Dialogues which they had prepared the previous day. Designated role-play led to lively interchanges and valuable hands-on experience—and helpful feedback.
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