b7028166 – DigiCivics @ APL

SIA Week 5 Log

This week we researched further into digital solutions for public engagement and we found some examples which deal primarily with engaging public opinion on a local level. From our seminar work we found the example ‘Viewpoint’, which is a digital interface that allows residents to vote and submit their opinion on local matters. The original Viewpoint technology was developed as part of the Bespoke project and it allowed local councillors and community organisers to ask simple questions with binary answers. A concept like viewpoint would reduce the time needed to complete door-to-door surveys. It would also remove the unpredictability of uncertainty, as we found out, door-to-door are not always successful. Cons of the product however, include the loss of the personal face to face conversation that community thrives on, the lack of explanation or elaboration of peoples’ opinion.

The Viewpoint example can be seen at: https://blackboard.ncl.ac.uk/bbcswebdav/pid-3867159-dt-content-rid-13421720_1/courses/K1819-TCP2031/Reflections%20on%20Deploying%20Distributed%20Consultation%20Technologies%20with%20Community%20Organisations.pdf

We hope to continue looking for more examples in the following days.

We also finalised our user research tasks and performed door-to-door surveys around the streets of Wingrove with one of our project partners, Katrina, the Greening Wingrove CIC Community Organiser. Whilst surveying local residents we also took this opportunity to interview Katrina about her personal thoughts on the area and the aims for the Arthurs Hill building. She spoke passionately about the need of more activities for the youth, ranging from toddlers to teenagers, and about the interconnection and potential link the building could have with other community facilities within the area, such as Nunsmore park.

From our door to door survey we obtained 20 responses. Of the people who answered the door their opinions seemed to echo Katrina’s in their vision for a thriving youth programme within the area. Below are the questions we asked and the most common responses we received:

What activities or events usually take place in this area? This question received various responses including Greening Wingrove events, Nunsmore litter picking, community groups and parties. However, of the 20 responses, 10 said that they did not know of any.

What are the changes Arthur Hill should make to become more socially environmental? The most common response was creating or finding things for the youth to do, such as having kid’s clubs. There was also mention of waste management, a community centre and a social media platform for communication.

How do you feel about interaction within the area? (Ranked 1-5, 1 = poor, 5 = good) Out of the 20 responses, the average response given was 2.7, which is a fairly poor response. Not a single person gave a 5 response and 1 was given four times.

How close are you with your neighbours? (Ranked 1-5, 1 = poor, 5 = good) Out of the 20 responses, the average response given was 2.6, which is also a poor response. From this question and the one before it is clear that there is room for improving social interaction in the area.

Do you wish to improve your interaction with your neighbours? (Yes or No) 13 respondents said that they would want to improve interaction with their neighbours.

Do you think a digital platform would help with this? (Yes or No) 15 respondents said that they believed a digital platform would help with improving interaction in the area.

What is your experience of using local facilities? (Ranked 1-5, 1 = poor, 5 = good) The average response received here was 2.9, so just below a satisfied response. Again this proves there is room for improvement.

What local facilities do you often use? This question received a wide range of responses including restaurants, church, cafes, Time Centre, transport, shops and supermarkets. However, the most frequent response was green spaces and parks.

How often do you use existing local facilities in a week? From the responses, the average response was 2.4 times a week. The most common response was once a week.

Do you use existing social platforms (such as Facebook groups) regularly? (Yes or No) Only 10 of the 20 respondents said they use existing social platforms regularly.

What do you use these social platforms for? Of those that said they used the social platforms, entertainment and news were the most common response. Arranging meetings and reporting issues were the other responses given.

Whilst surveying door-to-door, we did come to the realisation that this method is not as successful as pre-arranged interviews or meetings, it is a long process with little outcome. We felt that for the most part, a digital solution could be a highly effective potential going forward, taking inspiration from the Viewpoint boxes, which we found in our example search. From this, our digital design could be focused on gaining a broad and ranged opinion from a digital polling system. Whether this could perhaps be an interface inside/outside the building or in local shops/cafes is something we would have to discuss further.

Another idea that came from the user research was potentially creating a digital interface for the youth of the area to connect with the building, and the area, as we learnt of the hardships of many of the families within the area. It could potentially be worth-while to create an interface for the youth of the area, as many come from disenfranchised homes, some even being crammed into a house with 5 or 6 families, as we learnt from Katrina.

Our next steps for the project is to begin mapping out and sketching our digital interaction solution. Bringing together both our example search and user research to create the best solution for public engagement and interaction within the Wingrove area.

SIA Week 4 Log

Week 4 Log

This is the week 4 log for SIA. This week we carried out part of our user research, meeting with various project partners and also began searching for examples of products/services/devices that serve as state of the art in our project.

User Research:

As part of our user research we went to the Greening Wingrove Annual Meeting on the 16^th February. We felt as though this meeting would give us a huge opportunity to meet some of our project partners and potentially even meet some local residents in the area. The event was also useful as it took place at 250 Philip Street, Arthur’s Hill (the building that part of our project is based on) and so we got a much better idea of the actual building we were working with.

At the meeting, we spoke with David Webb, who is a local resident and the Secretary of Greening Wingrove CIC as well as one of our key stakeholders in the project. Below are the most important and valuable points we obtained from the interview with David:

Currently local residents communicate through WhatsApp groups and Facebook pages. The WhatsApp groups are used to contribute ideas and thoughts, but are rarely used, with David mentioning that ‘messages are transferred maybe once every two weeks’. The Facebook groups are slightly more active. However, the problem is that there are many different pages and so trying to organise larger events or communicate on a large scale is difficult.
The main issue David said we would have with our project is that not everyone will use one form of social network, which on one of the reasons multiple platforms are currently used.
David’s vision for the building involved using it for multiple purposes. Ideas included a post office, renting out the top rooms for storage, use of the already in place music studio and events for the youth including youth clubs and weekly activities.

We also managed to speak with other members of Greening Wingrove with the main points from them being:

Not enough is available for younger generations to do, with many just roaming and playing on the streets.
There is a difficulty in getting all the locals involved in the area. This is primarily due to language barriers and people not knowing what events are out there.

We aim to continue with our user research in the following weeks with our door to door surveys. We are also hoping to organise an interview with Katrina Jordison, the Greening Wingrove CIC Community Organiser, as we were not able to speak to her for too long at the annual meeting.

SIA week 3 Log

Log 3

This is the week 3 log for SIA. This week we have been working on user research for our stakeholders including Nigel Todd, David Webb, Jude Murphy, Katrina Jordison and the local residents of the Wingrove area. The two methods we chose to use to collect our user research are door to door surveys and interviews with local residents and the project partners.

Door to door survey: We have chosen to survey the local residents as surveys generate quick statistical data about our chosen sample. Surveys can be very useful in this sense as they will help us understand the big picture and provide us with statistics that can help to inform the direction of our project. Since we are obtaining this data in a door to door format, it is critical that the survey is short and questions are concise to ensure we capture the main opinions we are after.

Interviews with project partners: For the project partners (Nigel Todd, David Webb, Jude Murphy and Katrina Jordison) we chose to interview them informally. With these interviews, we can interchange views and ideas and hopefully collect information that will enable a deeper analysis of a given problem. Hopefully we will engage in a lengthier conversation which touches on their current aims for public engagement and digital platform and the issues the organisations deal with on a neighbourly basis.

What insights we hope to gain:

From our user research, we hope to gather a much more detailed insight into the project. We chose these two methods as they will help us obtain information on opinions and perceptions on a local and professional level. By collecting this data we hope to gain knowledge on how the area is managed now, and how residents are made aware of events and developments within the community. From the interviews with the organisation members and David Webb, a senior lecture in town planning and also a local Wingrove resident, we hope to gain knowledge of how they feel on an organisational level, as well as a paralleled local level, about how the area currently engages with projects and events, and how they think this could be improved for the future. In addition, we also hope to gain a wider image of their vision for the future of the area.

Questions we have come up with for…

Local Residents:

How do you feel about community interaction within the area now?

Do you think this could be improved?
Could this improvement be in the form of a digital platform? If so what would you like to see?

What is your experience of the current use of the facilities in the area?

How did you hear about the reuse of the building on Arthurs Terrace?
Would you engage with the building after its refurbishment?
Any ideas for the building?

Do you think that interest in community connection is focused on by a certain demographic? (one of our stakeholders being schools).

What do you think to using the primary school as a main stakeholder?

Project Partners:

What is your role and background, in the area/community?
How do you feel the area receives information and communicates internally now?
How do you currently attempt to engage with the public?
What are your aims for the area? And for public engagement?
Could public engagement be progressed by the involvement of a digital platform?

David Webb

What is your role and background?
How do you feel, as a local resident, information is distributed now between the community? Is there a social space for the residents?
How do you feel, as a professional, the area is managed by the different organisations? Is there anything that could improve this for future progression?
Do you have any opinions on the current use of social media to connect the different events/organisations within the area?

Below are photographs of our session together in which we brainstormed different questions and ideas for the user research process.

SIA Week 2 Log

This is the second log by SIA for the Wingrove project. This week we met with Nigel Todd who is a local resident and City Councillor, as well as Chair of the Greening Wingrove CIC and Secretary of the WEA Green Branch. The WEA Green Branch undertakes activities such as courses and workshops that can help community groups understand sustainability and work better as a community. With his various roles, Nigel gave us a greater insight into the project and helped us understand what aims and goals the WEA Green Branch has for the task.

This week we made a mind map that discusses all the different stakeholders involved in the project and the various links between them.

Mind map:

We began by naming the main stakeholders such as families, local residents, community organisations and WEA Green Branch, then branching off from these, connecting in other local groups. We discovered that the WEA Green Branch would have a link with the Greening Wingrove Community Interest Company and also with investors (who provide grants for events and developments). Volunteers and students from Newcastle University were also interlinked within this group as they would help provide support for many of the events done by WEA and Greening Wingrove. Another connection was found between the WEA and schools in the area, as education centres are a central hub for community connection. We felt having schools as one of the key stakeholders would help disburse information more effectively. Lastly, from schools there comes a link with families, the police, businesses and the council, therefore creating a bridge between the different interest groups within the area.

Stakeholder Groups:

Below are the three main stakeholder groups (the council, local residents and community organisations) we have found for the project:

In order for the project to be a success, each group’s wants and needs must be taken into consideration. Therefore communication with the three will be very important when working on the project.

Indicative Project Aims:

After speaking with Nigel, we found that the primary focus of the project was to develop ideas for community uses of the new buildings on Arthurs Hill Terrace. He mentioned existing ideas included a café, offices and potential for a music studio in part of the building. There was also a plan for rooms in the building to hold children’s activities and youth projects. However, the council and community organisations were open to any new/different ideas. Finding ways of enabling neighbours to get to know each other and feel comfortable about interacting is another of the key project aims. From the talk with Nigel it is clear that finding an appropriate use for the building will be a key stepping stone in creating public togetherness and community cohesion in the area.

There was also discussion of creating a digital platform for locals to interact with each other and finding a platform (such as an app, website, etc.) that would be suitable for everyone.

Next steps:

During the discussion, questions of how we could involve as many people as possible in the project arose, as it is unlikely every user or stakeholder group will agree on the outcome of the renovation idea or digital platform. Nigel himself did hold some reservations towards a larger digital platform, as different groups in the community may exploit it by uploading or sharing inappropriate or negatively opinionated content. At this stage with his hesitance, collecting user research from the local residents would be a natural progression.

Therefore, out initial next steps are to visit the Arthurs Hill Terrace building and the area of Wingrove in general. We are planning on going to the open day at the Arthurs Hill Terrace building on the 16th February where the future use of the building will be discussed. Visiting the area and building will help us collect user research on possible uses of the building and find out which digital platforms locals would be interested in for information distribution and social connections. It will also enable us to get a better insight into the project as a whole, understanding the people and area we are working with.