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How Children’s Centres Can Use Social Networking Sites To Consult And Engage With Parents And Their Local Communities

Want new ways to engage with your service users? Want to know their views almost instantly? Try social networking sites.


The way the public communicate is changing so fast it’s almost incredible.

Fewer people have a landline phone, more and more have some sort of call barring or caller-ID checks and won’t answer their front doors – even email is in rapid decline amongst younger people.

In fact younger people much prefer Instant Messaging, texting and other more immediate alternatives and they see email as like writing a letter.  

All this means that traditional ways of communicating and involving people are fast becoming a thing of the past.

These are some of the many reasons why we are putting on a day just for Children’s Centre’s.

If you want to engage and consult with people now you must communicate the way they do.

You should be using SNSs and other Web 2.0 websites that allow people to get in touch online and add their own content and views.

From the point of view of Children’s Centres social networking sites offer huge opportunities.

Apart from being the preferred method of communication for many people, they give you their thoughts in real time and they can be a powerful tool for involvement.  

As you know things can change, problems can flare up overnight and people’s views can alter significantly over time. Often you have no way of knowing what people think and what concerns them.

You need to know what happens as it happens, not a year or two later and that’s exactly what social media, through social networks, blogging, and video sites such as YouTube offer.

In addition social networking sites are a relatively economical way to promote  your Children’s Centre , to ‘spread the word’ about it and to help create a sense of belonging  and community for those parents taking part.

We think that social networking sites are so important that we have asked one of the UK’s top experts on the subject, Claudio Franco, to deliver a new course for you.  I doubt if anyone is better fitted to tutor this workshop than he is, but more about Claudio in a minute.

There is a number of ways you can use social networks to consult and engage with the public and Claudio will show you what you need to know and do to start using them.

There are also pitfalls to avoid and he shows you what to look out for - and how to minimise the problems.

Some issues that we will look at include:

It can be difficult to predict the level of interest you will get. If  local communities really do get hold of your project you will get a lot more responses than you expected. In fact the greatest problem can be too much information.

You might find you are opening up a Pandora’s Box as you may not like what you hear. It’s one thing to start a conversation on social networking sites, but it’s another to listen to what they have to say. You might hear things you don’t want to hear - yet they might things the community feels very strongly about.

Far more tricky is when a small pressure group hijacks or completely takes over your consultation and so skews the results. We’ll show you techniques for picking up on whether such a group is threatening to do that as well as how to  stay in control.     

Then there is the criticism that you might only be gaining the views of the “Twitterers” or those people who are compulsive users of social networks.

You run the risk of ignoring the 50% of the population who do not use social media. These might be the less well off and some hard to reach groups. We look at how these points might affect the validity of your projects.  

So we will also look at current measures being tested to reduce the ‘digital gap’ and some ideas and suggestions to increasing the digital literacy of local parents, whilst at the same time developing their IT skills.

You will leave this course ready to go out and create a Facebook Page for your Children’s Centre. And you will hear about good practice, case studies and engagement strategies for social networking sites.

I doubt if anyone is better fitted to run this workshop than Claudio.

Your tutor for the day is Claudio Franco. I could not think of anyone better suited, as besides being an expert on how children and young people use the Internet he has vast experience of working with and researching their needs. 

Your trainer

Claudio Franco has worked in the public, third and private sectors as a researcher of children and young people, He has skills in both qualitative and quantitative methods. His projects range from researching drug dealers and users, employment and crime through to young people’s housing needs.

Claudio currently heads up the Web and Online Gaming Research section of a widely respected Youth and Children’s Research organisation



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