IDENTITY PROJECT EVALUATION2011 - 2013 An evaluation of the Identity project from the

beginning in 2011 to the end in 2013

CONTENTS

2 /Introduction

3 /Launch at the Tall Ships

4 /The Identity Team

5 /The Archivist’s Treasure

6 /National Qualifications

7 /The Volunteer Group

8 /Kith & Kin

9 /Web Archive

10 /Creating Booklets

11 /Exhibition Boards

12 /Comet Animation

13 /The Song of the Clyde

14 /Larkfield Documentary

15 /Guerra Guerra

16 /Heritage Festival

17 /Identity Learning Curves

HISTORY’S LIKE A STORY IN A WAY

IT DEPENDS ON

WHO’S TELLING IT

INTRODUCTION

he Identity project was funded by Heritage Lottery Fund Scotland in 2011 to collect family histories and personal stories T

relating to over 200 years of migration to and from the area we now know as Inverclyde.

Over the last two years we’ve worked with almost every school in the area to create songs, leaflets, animations and books which all celebrate our heritage. We’ve had volunteers produce leaflets and exhibitions on the history of our local boroughs, the grim reality of capital punishment in the area and the stories of those transported from our shores. We’ve even had a group of volunteers stage a drama at the historic Sugar Sheds in Greenock, bringing individual stories of migration to life using theatre, music and archive

film. All of these have provided more opportunities for local people to explore their heritage, but they have also helped local young people gain qualifications and employment.

It’s our intention that Identity will continue in other forms after the end of funding, certainly The Trust will be continuing to support and explore local heritage through other programmes, most notably The Dutch Gable House, the historic building we have recently purchased for development.

All the Identity project materials will remain live on our blog, but the main way you will be able to continue to stay involved will be through our new project website at www.identityinverclyde.co.uk . The volunteers will be continuing to collect personal histories and reminiscences from the area and making the recordings and images available online. You can see some short films of the stories from this book online now. It is our hope that the site will remain a living archive, and we need your help to make that a reality.

DOROTHY SALISBURY DAVIS

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Links:- Youtube/Identity Promo VideoIdentityInverclyde.blogspot.co.uk

LAUNCH AT THE TALL SHIPS

he Greenock Tall Ships Festival in 2012 marked the official launch of the Identity project. The Identity team was present at T

the event where a stall was hired and the project began to raise its profile and engage with the wider community and recruit volunteers. We used marketing materials previously produced by the Identity team to raise awareness of the project and highlight Inverclyde’s extensive history and heritage. This was the first event engaging with the wider community for the Identity team and laying a foundation for the project to build on and establish roots within the community. Along with these promotional materials there was also the oppurtunity for people to volunteer and be a part of the Identity project.

This was the first of these promotion and recruitment events and served as a good learning experience for the team.

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IDENTITY MEANSWHO YOU ARE,WHERE YOU COME FROM,YOUR BACKGROUND,WHAT MAKES YOU YOU

THE IDENTITY TEAM

he Identity project created employment positions for 16 young people aged T

between 18-25 years old. The positions supported the young people to develop skills and upgrade their CVs, enhancing their opportunities to secure employment or to return to Further Education.

In May 2011 the Identity team was founded with a project manager, 2 film makers and a graphic designer. Through youth employment programmes the team employed 5 people who secured a place with the project. This first round included 3 graduate animators, a sound engineer and a researcher. Working on a variety of projects in the local community, all of the employees were given the opportunity to engage their skills within the Inverclyde community and contribute to the production of a variety of materials including a graphic novel, 2 booklets, several videos and an animation. They also researched and gathered information on the heritage and history of inverclyde which contributed to Identity’s online archive.

In February 2012 a new group of 18-25 year olds joined the team on the future jobs employability programme. There were 5 new vacancies which were filled by a history graduate, a film maker, an administrator/ group facilitator and 2 researchers. This new team worked on facilitating the volunteer

group, researching and developing the ‘Kith and Kin’ book, gathering stories for the website, as well as assisting in the management of the drama in the Sugar Sheds and helping to create more films and booklets.

In September 2012 two new 18- 25 year olds joined the team as replacement history and photography graduates. This team worked on a documentary film about Larkfield, an animation with a local school, gathering information for the website and

delivered a variety of workshops within local schools.

As the team reduced in size with the project drawing to a close, a new development worker was hired making the team now a manager, 2 film makers, a graphic designer and a development worker. This small team managed to deliver a week long drama workshop in a local high school, created more booklets and exhibition boards, and went on to exhibit all of the materials gathered and created throughout this project in a week long heritage festival.

Working with the Identity team provided these young people with a chance to work at a job relevant to their degree, gain relevant experience, try new things within their job and learn new skills, as there were many training opportunities made available.

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FROM WORKING ONTHE IDENTITY PROJECTI FEEL I’VE GAINED

MANYSKILLS

THE ARCHIVIST’S TREASURE

he Archivists Treasure’ is a graphic novel based on local myths and legends. T

This book was developed from October 2011 - June 2012. It was launched in July 2012 with it’s premiere being held in the Dutch Gable House in Greenock.

In developing the project, we decided we wanted to give as many local schools as possible the opportunity to be involved, and so worked to create a character and setting that would allow us to use a selection of very short stories, not necessarily in historical order. We settled on the idea of an Archivist guiding local school pupils through his archive.

16 schools helped us with the project. Each school had just a few weeks to get their pages together, with our artists coming in to sketch ideas as the class explored their stories; some classes chose to focus on stories related to the area surrounding their school, others worked with family members to find a story, a few came with us to our own local archive at the Watt Library to get some ideas.

5000 copies of the completed graphic novel were printed. The launch of the novel took place at the Dutch Gable House in Greenock where copies were given away to members of the public. The book was met with a very positive reaction from the public and to date, all 5000 copies of the book have been distributed.

‘

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A WONDERFUL PIECE OF WORKEXACTLY WHAT THE

SHOULD BE USED FORCOMIC STRIP MEDIUM

Links:- Scribd/The Archivist’s Treasure

NATIONAL QUALIFICATIONS

n September 2011, the Trust offered a group of pupils from St. Stephens High School the opportunity to achieve a National qualification I

in Film and Media. As part of the course, pupils were required to attend James Watt College for a period of time in order to learn the basics of Electronic News Gathering in conjunction with

the technical aspects of film making.

Interview skills were also taught to the pupils as they would be required to interview members of the community on their family history, and where they came from. Once this training was completed, the pupils spent sixteen weeks out in the

community visiting primary schools in order to use their newly obtained skills to record historical stories, which would then be transcribed and saved on to a community archive, so that future generations can obtain a picture of what the region was like many years ago.

While this was going on the Trust also offered a group of pupils from St Columba’s High school the opportunity to achieve a National Qualification in Creative Writing. They attended a series of workshops facilitated by industry professional Dan McCahon, who for sixteen weeks tutored them in the art of scriptwriting, with the end goal being a completed drama showing the roots of Inverclyde, and how all the different groups of people who make up Inverclyde arrived here, and how they lived.

Once the script was completed it was then passed to a troupe of actors to be transformed in to a live community performance, which would result in those participating obtaining a National Qualification in Drama.

The final performance was in the Greenock Sugar Sheds, a venue that, although iconic, is in a state of disrepair and so proved a difficult task to set up. In the end though the choice of venue proved popular and generated interest in the drama, which went on to receive good reviews from all those who attended.

To aid with the Drama, the Trust also offered a National Qualification in Animation, which would see students working towards the creation of animated backdrops for the final performance.

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THEY WERE CAPABLE

SOME PUPILS SAID TO ME THAT THEYDID THINGS ON THAT PROJECT THAT

THEY DIDN’T THINK

OF DOING

Links:- Youtube/NQ ShowreelYoutube/Identity Drama Highlights

THE VOLUNTEER GROUP

he Identity Project offered volunteering opportunities for older members of the Inverclyde community. We successfully T

recruited 12 people through a variety of events and promotional material, and the group met on a Wednesday and Thursday morning at 7 ½ John Wood Street, Port Glasgow.

The group came together to participate in a variety of training and research. Firstly the group focused on tracing their Genealogy of their families to establish where they came from before settling in what is now Inverclyde. A ten week programme was delivered with the support of Identity staff from The Enterprise Centre at St Stephen’s High School, Port Glasgow. The

volunteers upgraded their skills, especially with computer literacy and research techniques.

The volunteers gathered information which would be used to compile a book on the lives journey of their ancestors coming to Inverclyde. Kith and Kin was designed and produced by the Identity staff members Craig McEwan (Group Facilitator) and Francesco Ottaviano(Graphic Designer). 1000 copies of the publication were printed.

The volunteers also undertook an intensive training course of gathering Oral Histories and preparing material for website content. The website was designed by a Company called Sugar Shaker and training delivered by

Howard Mitchell.

The volunteers found some of the training intense and difficult to grasp, as their technical knowledge of IT was limited. However Craig Millar, an Identity Team Member, simplified the training manual and produced a booklet with clear concise step by step instructions which the volunteers found helpful.

Within the 18 months the volunteers have produced the Kith and Kin book and launched the Identity Website- two major outcomes for the Identity Project.

I WOULD NEVER IN MY WILDEST DREAMS

BEFORE I STARTED COMING HERE

HAVE THOUGHT I’D BE AT THE STAGE I’M AT NOW

;

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KITH & KIN

ith and Kin is perhaps the best example of what the Identity project K

is all about; people exploring and sharing their own family histories, allowing us to reflect on our own. The voices of our volunteers come through very strongly in the book, and that’s how we hoped it would be; this isn’t a history book in the traditional sense, more a treasured family scrapbook which you are being invited to

enjoy, perhaps finding in these stories, something that chimes with your own family’s life and times.

The group received Genealogy training and, with the help of our staff, researched their own family histories. Much of what we found was very interesting with links and stories that surprised us. Through this research we created a family tree for each volunteer and got as many family pictures as we could.

All of this was compiled and used to create 5 pages for each volunteer, detailing their family history and displaying their family trees and pictures. These pages then went to our

graphic designer, who worked together with the volunteers to create pages that they were happy with and that would fit nicely into the final book. Our researchers also wrote index pages which would fit in between the volunteer’s pages. These pages were of more well known local people, whose stories related to those of the volunteers.

The book went to print and was launched in June 2013 to head off the heritage festival week in Greenock. The book was very well received by those who came to pick one up with much positive feedback being received from the general public. Most importantly though was the feedback of the volunteers, who were extremely pleased with the final book and proud to have been involved.

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THAT THEY’VE SEEN

IT’S ABSOLUTELYONE OF THEBEST BOOKSABOUTINVERCLYDE

Links:- Scribd/Kith & KinInverclyde-TV/Kith & Kin Book Launch

WEB ARCHIVE

he idea behind the web archive was to create a repositry for stories, T

archiving them for future generations. This website would be run by the volunteers who would build on the work already done by the Identity team. This meant training the volunteers to create content for the site, but also to moderate the site.

The website was developed by a web design company based on the ideas of the team and the volunteers. The idea was that the site display a map of Inverclyde, with each story represented by a marker displayed in whichever area was most appropriate. Once selected the marker would open up to show videos, pictures and stories relating to that area.

The Identity Volunteer Group worked with Howard Mitchell, a professional from the Scottish Oral History Group based in Edinburgh. The bespoke Oral History Training would teach the volunteers to record, preserve and interpret historical information, based on the personal experiences and opinions of the speaker. This included interviews with eye witnesses’ accounts about the past, but also stories passed

down over the years by word of mouth. Oral history interviews include the perspective of the ordinary people.

The group also received training from the company that designed the website. This training showed them how to use the website and how to edit content and add their own content.

All of the volunteers took up the opportunity to retell their stories and capture them digitally to be included on the Identity website. Their ability to create their stories was firstly through skills learned via the Oral History Training.

The Identity staff were also included in the training. This allowed them to understand the structure and outcomes of the project and how best to support the volunteers in developing their stories.

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REALLY EXPAND NOW

THE WEBSITEWHICH HAS GOT SOMEGREAT INTERVIEWSBUT WHAT’S CRUCIALIS TO GET THAT TO

Links:- Identityinverclyde.co.uk

CREATING BOOKLETS

ne of the Identity Project’s outcomes was to research and O

present its findings in the form of 8 page booklets. There were 6 produced, detailing periods of history in the Inverclyde area.

A Highland Halloween- The Identity staff team worked with two local primary schools- Lady Alice and Highlanders- to identify the source of Halloween and how the tradition has remained and developed over the years.

The Greenock Hangings- Working with Inverclyde Academy, young people researched and sourced archived records held with a range of National Archives to contribute to the design of the booklet. The young people found interesting stories behind the hangings which took place in Greenock.

Death and Disease- James Watt College students spent three sessions visiting the local archives at the Watt Library to search the Newspaper Archive which holds articles dating back to the 1800’s. The students found information on an outbreak of Typhoid which impacted on the wider community.

Scars on the Community- Pupils from St Columba’s High School researched using the internet and material sourced from Scottish

National Archives to contribute to the design of the booklet, which is an account of the Italian Community through World War 11.

Trials and Transportation- The research for this booklet was contributed by the pupils at St Columba’s High School. They researched using the Internet and other archives. The young people also received ASDAN Credit for their academic portfolios.

A Whale of a Time- Alex Hardie, a volunteer with the Identity Project, raised the profile of Whaling, telling accounts of his own adventures going to sea at 16 to join a Whaling Ship. Staff researched further into archives such as the British Newspaper Archive which contributed to the publication.

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ENDED UP THE SHAPE IT IS

IT GOT THEM TO THINKABOUT REALLY HOWINVERCLYDE

Links:- Scribd/Leaflets

EXHIBITION BOARDS

nother of the outcomes of the Identity project was to create a gallery of exhibition boards. Each board would A

be about a specific part of Inverclyde’s heritage and would be put together to create an exhibition about the history of Inverclyde.

The first set of boards were based on the research done by schools and volunteers and are about the history of the five boroughs of Inverclyde. They were created by our graphic designer and first exhibited in December 2011 as part of the promotion of the project. The boards received positive feedback with many people commenting that they had learned something new about their area.

The next set of these boards were created to promote the graphic novel and to give people an idea behind the idea and process of creating the novel. These boards were exhibited at the

launch of the novel and were a good tool for advertising and promoting the novel. Creating these boards also gave people an idea of all the work that went into the novel and what the process behind it was.

Upon securing permission from the National Library of Scotland to use many of their pictures of the Vennel and of old Greenock, we decided to create a third series of these exhibition

boards. These boards were designed to show off the photographs and create another exhibition. These boards, together with the original boards, were displayed at Unit 8 in the Oak Mall as part of the heritage festival week. Many of these photographs had never been displayed, and so had never been seen in Greenock before. The boards generated a lot of interest because they had never been displayed before, many people were curious where we had obtained these pictures, as many had spotted the house they grew up in or the house or street that their parents had lived in.

These boards became a good engagement tool, and a quick and effective way of setting up a gallery or exhibition. The boards could be produced and set up quickly and put to use wherever they were needed.

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IS LIKE

EXPRESSIONOF TELLING OURLOCAL PEOPLE

THE VISITORSTO INVERCLYDE WHAT

IT’S THE

PLUS A LOT OF

INVERCLYDE’S HISTORY

COMET ANIMATION

replica of P.S. Comet is situated in the town’s civic square in Port A

Glasgow- a tribute to the first passenger carrying paddle steamship in Europe. The boat was built by John Wood, a well known shipbuilder from Port Glasgow.

Local primary School St John’s in Port Glasgow participated in a 12 week programme of activity with support from the Identity Team to research and

create an animation on the History of P.S. Comet. The programme raised the awareness of an iconic heritage symbol of Port Glasgow’s past, but also paid tribute to the innovative designers and engineers who lived in the area.

The young people visited John Wood Street Regeneration Centre to utilise the skills of employees of the Identity Team. Craig Mitchell, a grauduate sound engineer, recorded the young people narrating the story and our film maker, Graeme Fyfe, created the animation using the children’s artwork. These elements were edited together to produce the finished animated film.

The animation premiered at John Wood Street in January 2012 and was shown to the schools involved. DVDs of the animation were also distributed throughout the community and there was very positive feedback throughout about the film.

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I THINK IT WAS OF

WHO WAS INVOLVED

EVERY PUPILCONTRIBUTEDIN SOME WAY

GREAT BENEFITTO EVERY PUPIL

Links:- Youtube/Comet Animation

THE SONG OF THE CLYDE

orking with a local school, our team helped the pupils of one class to write a song and create an original W

animated music video to go along with the song. The song and video were about shipbuilding on the River Clyde and how this has changed throughout the years.

Our team worked with a class from St. Patrick’s Primary School to write a song about shipbuilding on the River Clyde. The idea was that the song be split into three verses. One verse about wooden shipbuilding, another about iron shipbuilding and the final about modern steel shipbuilding. The tune for the song was taken from an old Greenock folk song. Once the song was written the students were taken to a professional recording studio to record the song.

As part of the learning aspect of this project, pupils were also taken to Ferguson’s Shipyard, which is one of the only shipyards left on the Clyde today. This trip gave pupils the opportunity to see first hand what they had been learning about. They were shown around the yard and talked to many of the employees about their role and how their work has changed through the years.

To create the animated video, our team worked with the pupils as the drew all the images that were needed to create the

animation. The chance to represent what they had learned in a visual way was something the pupils seemed to enjoy, and also gave them the chance to create their own characters and ships to go into the animation. Once all of the artwork had been collected, it was scanned into a computer and one of our film makers used them to create the animation.

The animation and song were premiered at an event in the school, where all of the pupil’s families were invited to see the song performed live and then along with the video. We also burned the song and animation, along with a ‘making of’ feature to DVDs and gave them out to the pupils and their families. This project received very good feedback from the pupils who seemed to enjoy all aspects of the project, and their families, who were impressed with what their children had created.

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WHEN THEY TALK ABOUT

THIS PROJECTTHEY’RE FULL OF ENTHUSIASM

FOR LEARNING

LARKFIELD DOCUMENTARY

arkfield is an area of Greenock which, up until the 1950’s, remained L

largely farmland and was the location for the Poor house, where many of the area’s poor sought refuge.

The area over time has developed its own community, with a number of schools allocated in the area to offer education to the expanding families who lived there.

The Identity team worked closely with three local schools to research and compile information on the History of the area. They interviewed and filmed local residents and people across

wider Inverclyde to create a documentary style film, retelling stories of the development of the area.

A group of young people representing the three schools met weekly over a 4 week period to study the research and stories and produce a song which accompanied the film. The young people had their song professionally recorded with the support of the Music Department at James Watt College.

This was the first time that a group had tried to document the evolution of the Larkfield as a community, and so many people who live in the area, or used to live there, became interested to see the film. We premiered the film at the Waterfront cinema in Greenock, in front of all the schools involved, as part of the heritage festival. The film was enjoyed by those who remembered the area, and many copies of the DVD version have been taken home.

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IT TO BE SO GOOD

THEY WANTED TO GO BECAUSETHEY WERE INTERESTEDIN LOCAL HERITAGE

THEY JUST DIDN’T EXPECT

GUERRA GUERRA

uerra Guerra was a project about the Italian community during the G

war. We wanted to gather information on this topic, then hold a week long drama workshop, where pupils from St Columba’s High School got the chance to learn about writing and acting. With the help of the team, these workshops were delivered by Dan McCahon and Donald Pirie.

To gather information about the Italian community, we held an open day in the Italian Club in Greenock and filmed those who turned up, as they told their stories of the time. These interviews were put to use to help the pupils as they wrote their drama.

These drama workshops lasted a week, in which the pupils learned about creating a story and characters, then taking these ideas and forming a script. They also learned about acting out their parts and how to be on stage. We had hoped that, by the end of the week, the pupils would have written their drama and be able to perform it.

On the final day of the drama workshops, the pupils got the chance to preview their drama in front of an audience of their families. They performed the drama to the delight of the crowd. What the group had produced was an impressive short drama written around two Italian families moving to Greenock and the hardships they encountered.

The final performance of the drama was presenter at

the Beacon Arts Centre in Greenock, this time for the public. The performances were done that day and both were excellent

By the end of the project the pupils had learned not only about writing and acting, but also about immigration and community. Many of the audience for the final performances were from the Italian community, who had a very positive reaction.

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I WANTED TO IMPROVEMY CONFIDENCEAND I FEEL LIKE IT’SREALLY HELPING

Links:- Youtube/Guerra Guerra PromoInverclyde-TV/Guerra Guerra

HERITAGE FESTIVAL

s there was going to be a week long heritage festival in Greenock, we seized it as a good opportunity to present our A

work. We decided to run three separate events at this festival. We ran an exhibition in Unit 8 at the Oak Mall, held different events at the Dutch Gable House and showed all of our videos at the Waterfront Cinema.

In Unit 8 we put up our exhibition boards and gave away our books, leaflets and DVDs. We got a lot of people through the door and managed to distribute a lot of our materials. We also got a

lot of positive comments about the exhibition, and it began to spark conversations about how things were and how they have changed.

At the Dutch Gable House we held the launch of the new book, Kith and Kin and the website on the first day, and for the rest of the week used it to hold many different things including a waulking group and folk music. We also held an open house, so that the community got to see the Gable House, and we gave away more books and DVDs. This event attracted many of the tourists visiting from cruise ships who wanted to see what Inverclyde had to offer.

We also played and previewed our films at the Waterfront Cinema. This opened with all of the schools who were involved in our films and animations attending to see the film they had all helped make. After the initial showing the screens were opened to the public and many people went to see the films and enjoyed them.

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AN OPPORTUNITY

THERE’S A WHOLE HOSTOF ACTIVITIES THAT WE

BUT NOT VERY MUCHAND THE FESTIVAL GIVES

Links:- Youtube/Heritage Festival Promo

KNOW SOMETHING ABOUT

TO EXPRESS THAT

IDENTITY LEARNING CURVES

he Identity Project was an ambitious and fast moving programme of activity, using Heritage and Arts as an engagement tool T

to raise awareness of Inverclyde’s connection with the past with reference to Immigration.

Given this pace throughout the 2 year programme, sometimes the opportunity was missed to connect with the reflective process, slowing down the mechanism to reflect on successes and challenges. The project did not perhaps celebrate the achievements of the Identity Staff and the wider community as well, or as often, as it should

have – it was always on to the next part of the project.

Although Identity invited all schools in the local area to engage in at least one of the outcomes of the Identity Programme, it can be recognised that working with fewer schools for longer periods could have offered a more in depth research programme perhaps allowing fewer young people the opportunity to learn more about the heritage of their area, but to spend more time with them learning.

The Future Jobs Programme created short term work placements, offering young people the opportunity to

develop and enhance new skills development and creating reference for prospective employers. However, the 6 monthly turnover of staff was a challenge, specifically from a continuous personal development perspective where, to manage Identity’s outcomes and train staff, was difficult for all of the staff team. As such, with the final group, we decided to employ a smaller team for a longer period – sure enough this team proved the most engaged and effective in delivery.

The volunteers continuously strived to meet Identity’s goals through an intense training programme, which worked with the outcomes for the programme, but trainee staff did not always recognise people’s own varied learning needs which, on reflection, would have to be addressed in future.

Similarly, the volunteer group, having received a great deal of training to help them feel confident in managing the archive and recording process themselves following the end of the project, have expressed some reluctance to do this unsupported. So The Trust will continue to

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support the group with staff time and additional voluntary support until this has been overcome.

While The trust has now delivered a range of heritage projects and programmes over the last five years, the scope and scale of Identity was significant – with some weeks seeing 10 different professional and trainee staff delivering four different types of workshop across half a dozen different schools and community venues. It was very challenging to run – though we certainly achieved all we set out to. The scale of the project has definitely resulted in greater and more sustained impact than our previous programmes. We have been pleased too, to see so many other new heritage projects and programmes develop locally as we delivered Identity, many of them tying in with us directly.

We think we have potentially developed a strong “brand” with Identity, and intend to continue looking at other cultural programmes which continue this theme of story collection and understanding the changing nature of our community from our new base at the Dutch Gable House.