National Standards for Community Engagement
/The National Standards for Community Engagement are a way to build and sustain the relationships between public services and community groups.
Read MoreWhat we do
We work directly with community organisations, people who work in communities and with people who make policy.
We deliver large scale programmes across Scotland to help build the capacity of the community sector, support public agencies to work effectively with communities and to widen participation in local democracy.
We support and manage a series of networks, using our learning from these and working with communities and community practitioners to inform policy and legislation.
A major part of our work is providing research, training and consultancy services. All of our services are tailored to meet the individual needs of the organisations and partnerships we support. Find out more about our training.
We work closely with the European Community Development Network and the International Association of Community Development.
Our key work
Featured
Our resources
Peer-led Practice Learning report
/A report from Barnardo's Scotland & SCDC about peer-led evaluation and the impact that the Barnardo’s Nurture Service has had on the people involved.
Read MoreLocal Place Plans: Challenges and Opportunities
/Using action research, we wanted to find out more about the implications of Local Place Plans were for the planning system and communities.
Read MoreStrengthening Community Councils
/Exploring how community councils can contribute to democratic renewal in Scotland.
Read MoreSupporting Communities: See where we're working
/Through our Supporting Communities programme we’ve partnered up with community organisations from across the country to help build skills and ideas important to them and their communities.
Island of Hoy, Orkney
We have been working with the Island of Hoy Development Trust to help them develop their approaches to community engagement and identify new approaches to engaging with members of their small island community. With a population of less than 500 and as a non-linked Orkney isle, the people of Hoy identified a range of issues that affect community life such as transport, broadband access, recycling, and play facilities.
This year through Supporting Communities we are supporting the Trust to work with other organisations on the island, and stakeholders across Orkney, to plan how they take forward the community’s priorities, and the groups are currently exploring the potential of developing an Island Plan for Hoy.
Five Sisters Community Partnership, West Lothian
The Five Sisters is a partnership of community organisations working in West Calder and surrounding villages of Harburn, Addiewell and Polbeth. The partnership seeks to work together on shared issues, responding to priorities identified in local community action plans, as well as establish stronger and more clear lines of influence with planning structures.
We are currently working with the partnership to support them in delivering this vision and to plan for collective approaches to community engagement, capacity building and action around community aspirations.
Ferguslie Park, Paisley
We are working with local organisations in Ferguslie Park and their partners, who have recently been involved in a wide range of community consultation and engagement that has identified community priorities and aspirations.
The partnership of organisations are exploring community-led action planning as a process for working together to take these priorities forward and to support the people of Ferguslie to develop and deliver their own community vision.
Buckie and New Elgin, Moray
We are working with local people and officers to support community involvement in the production and delivery of locality action plans in 2 areas in Moray (Buckie and New Elgin). Local steering groups have been hard at working in finding out community needs and aspirations. Once this is analysed and combined with the information/data from partners the hard work of creating the action plans will begin.
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Community Participation Action Learning Report
/This report aimed to develop learning, take actions, improve practice and reflect together on opportunities and challenges in the current context.
Read MoreCommunities matter to democracy
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Our response to the recent Scottish Government’s Democracy Matters consultation welcomes the idea of people having more control over what happens in their communities.
Read MoreKnowledge is Power
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SCDC and the Poverty Alliance worked with ten community organisations to co-design a resource framework which could be used to support communities across Scotland to conduct their own inquiries into the issues affecting them.
Read MoreWidening the Welcome
/Exploring the local experiences of refugee resettlement and how examines how community development approaches could be used to further refugee integration in Scotland.
Read MoreUnderstanding our Community: Community-led action research
/Training: Learn about the core values and processes of a community-led action research approach.
Read MoreAn introduction to community-led health
/Training: This training will focus on community-led approaches to health improvement and addressing health inequalities.
Read MoreHealth Issues in the Community - tutor training
/Training: The 2 day HIIC Tutor Training course is a SQA credit rated aims to equip participants to deliver credit rated Health Issues in the Community training.
Read MoreDoing ‘with' not ‘to' - an introduction to co-production
/Training: Learn about the importance of strong community relationships and networks which support opportunities for co-production with this training.
Read MoreVoice, an online tool for community engagement
/Training: This training will allow you to analyse, plan, implement and evaluate community engagement practice from small scale projects to strategic development.
Read MoreGrundtvig
/This is an archive page
Grundtvig - Network for Community development with marginalised social groups
This resource is one of the outputs of a partnership formed by four European organisations involved in community work and citizen participation with disadvantaged or marginalised social groups in numerous and diverse locations throughout Europe. The partnership includes Scottish Community Development Centre (UK), Cooperativa Estrategies de Transformacio Comunitaria Sostenible (Spain), Association of Local Democracy Agencies (France), Association of Community Developers (Hungary).
his Guide describes the overall learning from the partnership visits to Strasbourg (France) 1-2 March 2012, Glasgow (Scotland) 13-15 June 2012, Barcelona (Spain) 25-24 October 2012 and Budapest (Hungary) 9-12 April 2013. Click here
Video of the discussion from the partnership visit to Scotland. Click here
Video and pictures of the visits and discussion from the partnership visit to Hungary. Click here
Poverty Issues in Hungary - A short Introductory film for the Grundtvig Study Tour. Click here
In Favour of Local Action - A film about community action in Barcelona. Click here
Rural Ayrshire 21
/This is an archive page
SCDC is supporting a collaborative initiative which is aimed at providing targeted help, support and funding for rural areas across the three Ayrshire areas. Called ‘Ayrshire 21', it works with 21 local communities which have been least able to take advantage of development and funding opportunities in the past.
The initiative is the result of collaborative working between the three Ayrshire Councils, securing funding from the European LEADER project to create Ayrshire 21.
Working in partnership with local and Scotland-wide development organisations, Ayrshire 21 will support the communities to write community action plans that will help them build on the strengths they have and address the most important social and economic issues they face.
On these pages we post information about the programme, reports and papers, and presentations from events and seminars. Here you will find:
Reports
Communications brief August 2013: provides information about the purpose of the programme, the 21 communities, and the expected activities, plus summaries of presentations at various events
Action Research in the Community - a guide to community action research
Skills for Rural Community Development - practice guide
Presentations
Community Action Plans
East Ayrshire
North Ayrshire
Building Stronger Communities
/Training: Learn how to support community organisations to take effective action and a leading role in the development of their communities.
Read MoreAssets Based Approaches
/Assets based approaches are an integral part of community development in the sense that they are concerned with facilitating people and communities to come together to achieve positive change using their own knowledge, skills and lived experience of the issues they encounter in their own lives.
They recognise that positive health and social outcomes will not be achieved by maintaining a 'doing to' culture and respect that meaningful social change will only occur when people and communities have the opportunities and facility to control and manage their own futures. In community development terms, assets based approaches recognise and build on a combination of the human, social and physical capital that exists within local communities.
Community development interventions are based on the fundamental principle of equality. In Scotland, gaps in health and social inequalities continue to widen. SCDC recognises that assets based approaches will not, in themselves, alleviate the effects of long term structural inequality and disadvantage but are nonetheless vitally important within the context of current changes in national policy and a redefinition of the relationship between the citizen and the state. SCDC prioritises its activities in favour of working to support communities whose characteristics are defined by long term disadvantage.
Community-led Action Research
/SCDC has strongly supported Community-led Action Research for many years. We have substantial evidence that this form of research has built the capacity of individuals and communities to evidence the need for and achieve positive change in the services or support provided to their community.
Why Community-led?
By community-led we mean research defined, undertaken, analysed and evidenced by members of the community themselves. It is therefore research OF and BY the community and not, as is traditional, ON and TO the community. This distinction is fundamentally important because in the community-led approach it is the community who define and carry out the research to gather evidence and make recommendations for change.
Why Action Research?
Action research is about using research tools and methods appropriate to engaging with the community concerned. Example methodologies would include drawings, photography, video diaries; drop in sessions and story dialogue; these methods being used in conjunction with or instead of traditional methods such as questionnaires.
Emphasis is placed on ensuring the community is informed of the results of the research in ways that are appropriate to engaging them and showing the importance of their contribution.
Although support and training may be required for those undertaking the research, our evidence shows that, in addition to obtaining high quality research information, a community action research approach delivers:
Increased capacity and confidence individually and in community groups
Increased skills base which can be used again and which is transferable
Groups have increased community support
Evidence on which communities have been able to successfully argue the need for change in services and support for their community.
To find out more get in touch.