Helping refugees to settle in, Pershore Road

(Andy Wootton) #1

My friend Brid posted this on Facebook:

"So over the summer the awesome Dibah Grossfeld
has been running “welcome walks” for newly arrived asylum seekers in
our good city with the aim of offering a little bit of breathing space
from being stuck in a crappy hotel all day long with no money, waiting
on potentially life changing news from HMRC. It’s been lovely summer
evening walks and along the way we’ve had food, crafts, bonfires and
more food….I’ve met some really lovely people from more countries then I
could keep a count of.

It’s getting cold now and the group has been offered some really nice
indoor space at a church on Pershore Road to hopefully carry on through
winter. If you’re someone who might be able to help run informal stuff
with adults/children/both - like basic english convo, craft and music
workshops, indoor hockey/football etc etc between 5-6.30 on a friday
evening then please get in touch"

If there’s any interest from you South-siders, I’ll put you in touch. Maybe via running a Code Club with a bit of help from @timmy666 ?

(Tim Wilson) #2

Hi Andy,

Thanks for the referral! Be delighted to assist in getting a Code Club started. If there’s anyone on this forum who’d be interested in giving just one hour a week to inspiring kids to code, then I’d be delighted to provide more info.

The other initiative worth looking at is the Code_Door programme, which teaches refugees to code using volunteers. It’s being launched in Birmingham and I’d be delighted to put you in touch the organiser here, if you like too.

So here are two solutions, both of real value hopefully.

Please keep me in the loop.

Cheers,
Tim.

(Brid Rose) #3

Hi Tim,

Thanks for your reply!

The welcome walk group as it stands is generally for very newly arrived people, the accommodation we meet people from is very temporary and most people are only there for a few weeks at most before (hopefully) getting more permanent accommodation (which can be anywhere round the country). I think a code club specific to the group would probably be rather difficult with such a transient and unpredictable audience. If there is any kind of very basic activity though that you think could work with a group of all ages, language skills, not requiring laptops etc for an hour as a one off then obviously that could work.

I also work with a local group ( facebook.com/Kingsheathaction/ ) and will definitely add the Code_Door initiative to our ever growing list of refugee related resources in bham for signposting (we had a woman with a computer science degree the other week - wish I’d known then!) , and if there are any other existing local and free activities that would welcome children or adults then it would be great to know about too.

Thankyou,
Brid

(Andy Wootton) #4

@Brid_Rose Someone will probably ask you to introduce yourself. It’s a convention at geek club. This was a trick, we need more artists.

I know you’re mostly analogue at http://www.domakesayink.com/, “purveyors of T shirts to the stars” but someone designed that web site.

Mention your feline activities. Here be cat nuts.

Sudakistan? Didn’t know you’d captured the Swedish market.

(Andy Wootton) #5

@timmy666 What kit is needed to run a code club? If normally at schools, would you be using a Pi and a small monitor shared between 2 or 3 kids? Is that about £100?

(Brid Rose) #6

@Woo

Ha - I’ve printed so much stuff that’s gone to Sweden now…turns out it’s pretty cheap to send stuff there whilst we’re still EU anyhow…

My website is down at the moment as I keep starting it, changing my mind again, leaving it for a bit and repeat…but hoping to overcome this indecisiveness very soon.

But yes, I mainly screen print t-shirts and things by hand, I still design a bit from time to time but find the printing more satisfying…and I’m definitely a cat person :slight_smile:

(Andy Wootton) #7

I thought later that you could describe yourself by a series of tote bags.

(Tim Wilson) #8

Hi Andy,

Apologies for the delay.

Absolutely you can run Code Club off a Pi, mouse, keyboard and screen or you can run from laptops/desktops. After that access to wifi is always ideal but it’s possible to run the Code Club Scratch projects from the desktop version too.

Regading screens, it’s often worth asking around for screens as there might be organisations that have unused monitors that could be donated.

In a nutshell though, we are device neutral so as to ensure every venue can run a club with whatever equipment they have.