Give your community a voice! Engagement Champions next cohort.

VSI Alliance Newsflash

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Newsflash from the Voluntary Sector Infrastructure (VSI) Alliance team.

In a nutshell, the Engagement Champions programme is about capturing the views of local people and communities, especially those who are seldom heard, specifically in relation to health.

Voluntary, Community and Social Enterprise (VCSE) organisations are so well placed in communities to engage with residents.

This is where you come in!

Delivered by VSI Alliance on behalf of NHS Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group, the Engagement Champions programme supports reps from VCSE organisations to undertake training and become an accredited ‘Engagement Champion’ and give your service users and communities a voice when it comes to health services and proposals.

Here are some of the other benefits of
becoming an Engagement Champion!

Earn money for your organisation

Offered opportunities to carry out paid surveys and/or focus groups

Invited to local events where you can meet with the people and organisations involved in shaping local health services.

The Engagement Champions Training Timetable
All session are held online via Zoom.
Attendees need to be able to commit to attending all 4 sessions.

Training Session 1 How the NHS Works	Tuesday 11th October 2022	10am – 12:30 pm
Training Session 2 Legal and statutory obligations for engagement	Tuesday 18th October 2022	10am – 12:30 pm
Training Session 3 Engagement Methods & approaches	Tuesday 25th October 2022	10am – 12:30 pm
Training Session 4 Equalities, Safeguarding and Evaluation and Certificates	Tuesday 6^th December 2022	10am– 12:30 pm

Ready to be an Engagement Champion? Click here!

More information about the programme

The NHS has a legal duty to involve local communities/communities of interest when health changes are being considered and the training provides the knowledge and skills needed to carry out engagement and consultation work on behalf of the NHS locally. The training is free and once trained, volunteers will be able to give their organisation the opportunity to be approved providers of engagement for the NHS locally with the potential to carry out paid work.

The training is spread over 4 sessions (currently delivered on Zoom). The training provides an understanding of how the NHS works and why the NHS is required to involve local communities in changes to services. It covers methods and approaches to engagement and consultation which can be useful skills for your own personal development and benefit your organisation and also key information about equalities and safeguarding. Participants are asked to complete a practical task asking service users to complete a survey.

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