We wanted to know how the innovative approaches we have used in Village SOS work in practice, and how far the programme has helped to revive rural communities and enrich residents’ lives.
So we commissioned the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research (CRESR) at Sheffield Hallam University to carry out an evaluation of the programme.
The final report from the evaluation includes a wealth of detail about how the progamme has worked in specific communities. Although the full impact of the projects would still take time to come through, the evaluation found that:
- the role of village champions was crucial, and future initiatives of this sort might put more effort into choosing and matching champions to villages
- there were many opportunities arising from working with the BBC, but doing so also presented new tensions, not least because broadcasters' priorities will inevitably differ from those of BIG and of beneficiary communities
- social enterprise approaches can work, but will also have to deal with tensions – including between meeting the aspirations of the local community and focusing on sustainable business models.
For further information please contact us