A call to action: Crossroads Youth and Community Association's Knowledge is Power report

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With the support of Knowledge is Power, Crossroads Youth and Community Association (CYCA) carried out community-led action research within their community of Gorbals in the Southside of Glasgow. The report from the research is now available.

CYCA conducted two questionnaires and a focus group to find out what people felt about their community and how the Covid-19 pandemic was affecting them.

The research found that people in Gorbals wanted to see improvements to services, relationships between different groups in the community and to the local environment. Fincancial hardship was also identified as an issue which many people face. Covid-19 had impacted on people in terms of reducing social connectedness and increasing stress, fear and isolation.

Despite these challenges, people in the Gorbals highlighted what they liked about their community, particuarly how kind, caring and supportive it is. Participants in the focus group suggested a range of initiatives which could help Gorbals to flourish, including advice services and a befriending scheme.

The research concludes that more work is needed to get a deeper understanding of people’s priorities and concerns and the reasons for these, to go beyond ‘private troubles’ and highlight ‘public issues’. The report lists a range of actions CYCA will take, and some it has already taken, to build on the research and bring about positive change and improve the quality of community life. Planned actions include:

  • Publishing a statement on the findings and CYCA’s broader knowledge of the community to encourage local people to become involved;

  • Supporting local people to form an action group;

  • Facilitating the analysis of findings and identifying what else, if anything, is needed to know more about the key themes;

  • Providing ongoing skilled community development support to the group to develop a vision and action plan which would achieve the positive change and bring Gorbals nearer to being a flourishing community.