Tackling Knife Crime in southeast London

2026 kicked off with scribing some quite hard-hitting issues, and this was one of them. 

Unfortunately schoolchildren these days need this sort of education, on top of all the other things they're having to deal with (and I'm including social media!)

My favourite workshop was this one, as it was essentially using comic book stories as an educational vehicle, and they've done it really well! More on Penificent here: https://penificent.com/

Street doctors are doing such amazing work to educate young people as well: https://streetdoctors.org/

 

Crown Prosecution Service, London, Honour Based Abuse (HBA)

A very moving day of testimony and sharing examples of best practice both by the CPS, government, police and grass roots community charities, as well as people with lived experience of FGM (female genital mutilation) on how they're tackling this growing issue. 

MP Jess Phillips also spoke to launch the event. It's disturbing issue, and unfortunately a growing one.

Hackney - bringing communities together and building trust

Just sharing some methodology, sometimes I'm asked by clients to draw more of a 'rich picture' instead of visual minutes of each individual speaker.

In order to do this I try and get clear on what exactly they'd like depicted and then draw up a sketch using imagery to confirm what's needed:

And then on the day this comes to life!

I had a wonderful day yesterday in my old stomping ground of Hackney, London. This was a community and trust-building event, between the local council and the voluntary services. So many wonderful people doing very worthwhile work in their local communities, coming together to network and suggest ideas for improving the way the council works with them.

Net Zero Festival - Live Scribing

 Just posting this because it's a subject that seems to be getting more and more urgent.

This was for the business community and it was a two day educational and networking day, to showcase what's happening now and ask questions about what more can be done to get to Net Zero. 

From blank page...

To two days later, and many conversations and drawings in-between!

Inclusion London - Live Scribing for Staff Away Day

A fab afternoon working for this wonderful bunch of people. Inclusion London is a charity that supports Deaf and Disabled organisation in London and campaigns for equality for Deaf and Disabled people.

For more information about the work they do please look at their website here: https://www.inclusionlondon.org.uk/about-us/

The Lipman Miliband Trust - grants for socialist education projects

Last month I was really inspired by this evening of sharing and celebrating the work of the small grants given away by this trust to socialist education projects. Special mention to 'Kitty's Laundrette' in Liverpool https://www.kittyslaunderette.org.uk/ who go above and beyond to get people talking about current issues, and bring the local community together. Plus you can get your laundry done. Very hopeful work, showing the power of solidarity and sharing good ideas.

For more information on the grants and to apply for one please take a look here: https://www.lipman-miliband.org.uk/

 

Continuous learning and improvement at Cafcass

I have worked at the internal training event every year at Cafcass for the past five years. Every year is more ambitious! 5 intense days of learning, and for me, lots of digital drawing.

Here is a selection from this year, starting with the overarching themes:

And some of the individual sessions:

Phew, it's over for another year...but more roadshows, logo designs and workshops in the coming months. The need to keep developing never stops!

Enhanced Rock Weathering (ERW) - UCL Grand Challenges

University College London asked me to scribe at this event. This was a steep learning curve for me, but fascinating. All about using a natural process of rock weathering of basalt, but giving it a nudge to capture a lot more carbon from the atmosphere.

More on enhanced rock weathering is here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-65648361

If it works it could really help our warming planet!

SEND conference in Leicester

Please click on the image to enlarge.

A couple of weeks ago I was live scribing at this conference in Leicester because they spotted me working on a similar conference up in Derby last year. 

This inclusion conference was for the Discovery Trust https://discoverytrust.org/ and was the first gathering for quite a few years. It was a big cohort of about 600 and the room was just buzzing with enthusiasm and a lot of laughter.

I was really amazed at how much this trust has achieved in only 14 years. They have a large network of SEND schools, with other more mainstream schools also in the process of joining and they pool resources. This means that the kids get to enjoy a really well rounded education and are really given so many chances to exceed everyone's expectations. It's really wonderful :)

The Future of Work for Young People, London UK

A couple of weeks ago I was asked to scribe at a wonderful day of discussions, learnings, and poetry for a charity in central London. 

The aim was to dig deeper into the Youth Futures Foundation's research findings: what does the next generation want from their working life? Unsurprisingly zero hours contracts and unfair dismissal came up several times. Also: young people are being set up to fail, with poor HR treatment from small companies, a lack of training and progression. Young people need to be educated about their rights from an early age, as some of these experiences happened while the participants were still in secondary school.

This was commissioned by the Youth Futures Foundation https://youthfuturesfoundation.org/ in partnership with Durham University. 

After the morning's work, done on my ipad (above), in the afternoon I pivoted and drew up a mural using old school pens and paper on the wall, as the poetry workshop unfolded. An intense afternoon for the young people taking part! Please click on the image below to enlarge.

 

Urban Planning using Co-production in Croydon, South London, UK

Two years ago I worked for UCL's Coproduction team https://www.ucl.ac.uk/public-engagement/co-production-collective on an urban planning project, helping Croydon council bid for a pot of money from the GLA.

They won the bid, so I've been asked back to help record the co-production process. Image below is a work in progress, the 'vision' for the project is still tbc hence the blank banner space. 

There's a lot of work to be done in and around Croydon,  but as one of the participants said: "if you scratch Croydon it bleeds history" and they have a passionate group of local participants, so watch the space around Surrey Street Market!

Thanks to Niccola Hutchinson Pascal for asking me back, and for recommending me widely to her other UCL colleagues. I've worked on some really interesting projects this year.