CDEC is leading a group of organisations within the Same Storm, Different Boats project to bring to the fore and to support black, brown, minority ethnic, migrant and refugee people in Cumbria. The aim is to support these groups of people through the COVID crisis by pooling skills and experience harboured within the different organisations.
During its six months length (the project ended in March 2021), the organisations involved put in place practical support to help these groups of people through the COVID crisis here in Cumbria by combining their expertise.
Some of the ideas the project has working on include:
- helping educators and schools to better understand and implement anti-racism within their classrooms
- helping black and brown young people through a mentoring scheme, giving them a chance to talk about what it is like to be them, to share stories, and to use these experiences to create an animation - this has been further developed to create the Animated Futures project
- working with women from Cumbria's multicultural groups to celebrate International Women’s Day on 8 March. This was a huge success with over 100 women from all corners of Cumbria coming together to take part in an array of activities going on throughout the day, including a welcoming coffee morning, interactive African and Bollywood dance carousels and yoga classes, a Thai cookery demonstration, storytelling for children, a Singing Tree art workshop and an open mic style ‘Ladies night in’ featuring local poets and artists and the first screening of a new short film, 'Connected by Cultures', to celebrate the contribution of women from around the world living in the county.
- supporting Roma, Gypsy and Traveller groups within the community and education system who have been marginalised through this crisis.
Other projects that fall within this are the Bubble and Me project with M-Unit and Tullie House (funded by Curious Minds, with thanks).
By working together, CDEC, Anti Racist Cumbria, AWAZ Cumbria, Carlisle One World Centre, Furness Multicultural Community Forum, Multicultural Cumbria and M-Unit have strengthened Cumbria’s networks, solidarity and collaboration.
Becoming greater than the sum of our individual parts
Laura Goad, Director of CDEC commented “We hope our collaboration will allow each organisation and their mini-projects to become greater than the sum of our individual parts so that we can all best support black, brown, minoritised Cumbrians, migrants and refugees.”
Welcoming and resilient communities
She continues: “After six months, the aim is that here in Cumbria we will have better supported community groups as well as organisations that are stronger and better connected and that can use their expertise and experience in arts, culture and advocacy to support expressions of identity and belonging, and to create welcoming and resilient communities.”
The Same Storm, Different Boats project is funded by the Coronavirus Community Support Fund, distributed by The National Lottery Community Fund, with thanks to the Government for making this possible.
You can see what the project got up to through social media by searching for #SameStormDifferentBoats and at www.facebook.com/samestormdifferentboats
The project is kindly funded by
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