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What we do

NCBI Nottinghamshire challenges prejudice, tackles conflict and enables different groups to work together so that everyone has a voice. We believe that everyone is a leader and we train people from all backgrounds to lead with integrity in our diverse society. We do this through workshops, training, mentoring and specialist projects.  We also deliver volunteer team trainings and work together to develop our own leadership and empower our own communities and organisations. 

How did it all begin?

NCBI Nottinghamshire started out in 2004 with Nottingham resident, Cathy Meadows who wanted to bring the NCBI Welcoming Diversity model to the county.  With support from other NCBI teams, including Royston John from NCBI London, she led the first Welcoming Diversity and Prejudice Reduction (WDPR) workshop in Sneinton, Nottingham. Since then NCBI Notts has grown and developed, setting up as a charitable company in 2007 with a current team of nine.  We have worked with a variety of organisations and in the local community to teach NCBI skills, raise awareness, empower and work together to end discrimination in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire.

WHAT CAN NCBI NOTTINGHAMSHIRE OFFER YOU?

As an infrastructure organisation we can work with you in partnership to ensure that issues of racism, sexism and other prejudices which can undermine or weaken projects are dealt with in a safe and effective way enabling all participants to have a voice and be positively represented.

• Bespoke training for particular groups or situations or around specific oppressions.
• Accredited training courses.
• Support and mentoring to local organisations affiliated to NCBI.
• Community Mentoring Sessions
• Taster sessions for those interested in our work.
• Interactive awareness raising stalls and tasters at events.
• Workshops on current topics and controversial issues

Refugee Week

NCBI Nottinghamshire Event

NCBI Nottinghamshire–s 2nd Refugee Week event “They Don’t Want to Learn English” went really well - participants learnt a bit of Kurdish, Lingala and Korean as well as hearing/sharing the tougher issues experienced by English learners in the UK.

After a number of activities to build safety and raise awareness about language learning – something that many English people take for granted - the event culminated in a panel made up of English learners who are refugees with different levels of English and different identities including men and women, beginners, intermediates, parents with children/separated from their children, single people, people who identified as having mental health and/or physical disabilities, people from West and East Asia and from central Africa. One person spoke about getting called names in the street because of their “foreign” appearance, another spoke of how she could not attend English classes for the first two years after coming to the UK because she was not allowed a crèche for her pre-school children. Issues around mental health, disability, support and lack of support from the host community and previous experiences of schooling were also raised.

It was great seeing English learners sat out front sharing their different perspectives in their own words - everyone else in the group listened with complete respect. We used the NCBI model to create safety and the work NCBI has been doing with English learners around feeling proud and confident to communicate whatever your English levels really paid dividends.

It is very powerful when people who are usually not seen or heard are able to show themselves – and they were fantastic!

Allies Against racism

A key part of NCBI’s work is our work on being an ally; an ally is a member of an oppressor group who is actively working to challenge that oppression in themselves and in the community.

Allies against racism is a group of white NCBI Notts leaders who meet every month and use the NCBI model to explore and challenge our own prejudices, develop our skills in challenging racism and to support each other in being better allies.

Connecting Communities Community Empowerment Project

Background to the work

We knew from our previous work that:

People in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire regularly witness or experience prejudice and discrimination including racism and want to be able to challenge it effectively.

Informal and unconscious “segregation” exists between different communities in Nottinghamshire.

While organisations and groups are committed to equal opportunity policies they may struggle to put these into practice on a day to day basis

Many people wanted to reduce prejudice in Notts and make the area more welcoming, but were unsure how to do this. Some were on limited budgets and could not afford to attend/sustain training. We felt that our training would be a useful way to teach people practical skills to be able to do this, and devised a programme which included a workshop with follow up mentoring sessions for people to practise, review and develop the skills learnt in the workshop.

Aim of workshops and mentoring groups

• To build bridges across race, ethnicities, religious and other differences, and build community cohesion.
• To train people in leadership skills, conflict resolution, prejudice reduction and coalition building. These skills can be used by the individual in the family, at school or college, in the workplace or in the community, when prejudice occurs or conflict arises
• To bring diverse communities together and create enough safety to promote dialogue and understanding of different experiences.
• To empower individuals in communities to make positive interventions in creating change and to take leadership with integrity.
• To teach skills in conflict resolution so individual people can be allies to one another

Key achievements of project

• The project was delivered and managed successfully
• 50 people attended the three workshops.
• Diverse communities were brought together in a safe and meaningful way
• Participants included Muslims, Christians, Agnostic, Hindu, Atheist, Africans, South Asian, West Asian, East Asian, European, LGBT, Women, Men, refugees and people seeking asylum, English learners.
• Enough safety was created during workshops and support groups for people to talk openly about their experiences of prejudice and mistreatment
• Participants learnt leadership, welcoming diversity, and conflict resolution skills and practised them in mentoring sessions.
• All participants stated that they felt more confident in welcoming diversity.
• Participants said they noticed, and learnt more about, their own prejudice.
• All participants said that they felt more confident about interrupting prejudice
• All participants said that they had learned new skills and that their understanding of the issues had increased.

Participants’ Feedback

"Excellent training – thought provoking, inclusive, fair, practical skills and awareness raising"

"For me, the best thing was meeting people from diverse backgrounds and reminding myself that our prejudices are always lurking around in the undergrowth"

"[I} begin to value myself as a leader"

"hearing the impact of prejudice on members of the group was very powerful"

"The friendly, expert knowledge of the trainers"

"The best thing was working in groups and highlighting the ways we no longer wish to be treated"

"The Methods used were very effective"

"Wonderful"

"The best part was celebrating our identities – the encouragement that we should be confident in who we are"

"…being appreciated, valued and listened to and having the opportunity to listen to and value others"

What difference did the training make to the local community?

People in different organisations across Nottinghamshire have been taught, and are using, the workshop skills. They have made a commitment to look at their own prejudice and act towards others differently in the future:

"I now have a deeper understanding of prejudice"

"From now on I will be more sensitive to groups I don’t belong to"

"Listen more"

"Not making judgements about the way people look or sound"

"Not make assumptions that other groups have an easy life"

"Be less self critical - Remember that it’s ok to make mistakes"

"Challenge people in a constructive way"

"From now on I will notice and stop myself when I begin to think negative thoughts about a member of a particular group"

What next?

NCBI are seeking funding to extend this project and to bring NCBI 3-day leadership training to Nottinghamshire so that the Nottinghamshire community can learn the skills needed to deliver 1-day workshops and to embed this work in their communities and organisations.

All Community Empowerment Programme participants can stay involved with NCBI by

• Attending our monthly Team Trainings
• Joining our volunteer team to organise and deliver more community workshops.
• Volunteer with the other work we are involved with.
• Undertake further training with NCBI.

Key Lessons from the project

• Welcoming diversity involves more than bringing a diverse group of people together in the same place; it involves creating a safe and inclusive environment.
• To create this environment we need an understanding of how racism and other prejudices impact people and skills that can reduce defensiveness, increase inclusivity and deal with people’s mistakes with integrity. Otherwise, eventually people will become alienated and drop out.
• Leaders and organisations need to use and practise the values they want to promote in their work.
• NCBI’s model of prejudice reduction enables people in the community to take leadership by being more aware of, and acting against, the prejudice in society.