About Us

05 September 2010

Objectives and activities

On September 2008, the CGE started a three year project called “Making Connections: The Global Dimension and Minorities” funded by the Department for International Development’s (DFID) Development Awareness Fund. The project’s vision is to enhance the capacity of the minority ethnic sector in taking on an active role in global education. The project has three objectives:

  1. To provide training to enhance the capacity of the minority ethnic sector in bringing global issues alive. This training takes the form of an accredited course that includes training and continious mentoring. It will be offered five times over the life of the project, reaching 80 individuals.
  2. To support networking between the minority ethnic sector and the global education sector, but also with other actors who could benefit from this link, such as schools, local councils, and youth groups. This networking will happened in annual creative spaces in which practitioners will have the opportunity to meet, create and get inspiration from others. The networking will also be strenghten by the development of a dedicated newsletter for the ethnic minority sector and by the web site.
  3. To develop, collate and adapt a set of resources that will be accessible through a dedicated web site, which has an interactive tool box for practitioners.
     

Recruitment

For the recruitment of course participants it was important to reach organisations based all over Northern Ireland, therefore the rationale for the recruitment was by region. The first round started with the North East region building up a relationship with three organisations working with minority ethnic issues (Ballymena Interethnic Forum, Coleraine Multicultural Forum, and Ballymoney Resource Centre). The strategy was to talk with the organisations, listen to where they were at, and explore how global education could enhance the work they were doing. These organisations were willing to take part and most participants were contacted through them.

The second round of training focuses on the Southern Region, having as a key partner the Craigavon Intercultural Programme.

The involvement of local organisations is a key element in this project, not only in the recruitment process, but also in providing ongoing support to the ‘global educators’ in applying their skills and knowledge, and in strengthening the possibility of future collaborations.

The enrolment system consisted of completing an application form that shows that applicants are involved in some way in the minority ethnic/faith sector, have some prior experience in facilitation or training, as well as a working knowledge of English. 16 people are accepted for each training course.

The composition of the training group intents to be diverse (in terms of age, gender, nationality, ethnicity, religion, waged and unwaged, and sector).
The training lasts for a period of four months. It consists of one residential weekend, and four days training, plus continuous one-to-one mentoring that is provided according to the needs of each individual.