The West Midlands is bristling with creativity when it comes to community economic development. There is no shortage of people with good ideas to build sustainable communities. But there is a lack of help to get these ideas off the ground.
Mutual learning is one of the best ways to help people turn their good ideas from dreams into reality. Learning from someone like yourself who has travelled a similar journey to you, is often more powerful than formal learning.
At Localise West Midlands we have run peer mentoring schemes in the past, and there are good examples from the present such as Community Matters.
For the past two years we have been part of a national coalition looking at ways of getting peer mentoring and other mutual learning schemes off the ground. This coalition includes Transition Network, Regen SW, Permaculture Association, and Renew Wales.
Now Localise West Midlands has been awarded funding for a feasibility study by Big Lottery Fund to find out if there is a need and a demand for mutual learning schemes such as peer mentoring. We’ll be working on this until May 2019. For more information, please visit the project home page.
If you want to contribute thoughts or ideas, or know of others we should be talking to, please get in touch david@localisewestmidlands.org.uk
