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Engaging and Supporting Community Champions Event 2022 Report

Recruiting and working effectively with community champions within and beyond SSBC.

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Engaging and Supporting Community Champions Event 2022 Report
Engaging and Supporting Community Champions

Report from the Engaging and Supporting Community Champions Event 2022.

Small Steps Big Changes (SSBC) held a shared learning webinar in collaboration with The Literacy Trust on Thursday 21st July 2022. The event provided an opportunity to share the learning from two projects that engage with and support community champions. Findings from an evaluation of the Literacy Champions Project in Nottingham were shared alongside SSBC Parent Champion representative and WiT, who presented the SSBC Parents Still Leading the Way Report. This project explored ways of growing and sustaining parent voice, leadership and support within and beyond the organisation.

Attendees also heard directly from volunteers across the two projects, who spoke about their experiences of volunteering, including:

  • How and why they became and continue to be involved, the support they have received, their joys and successes, and the challenges that they face
  •  What really matters to them 
  •  Their ideas for continuing and extending the involvement of and support for volunteers in the future

The downloadable Event Pack includes the Parents Still Leading the Way Report, the Literacy Champions Project Evaluation and the keynote presentations. 

Through the Literacy Champions project, we want to address Nottingham’s significant literacy needs on a community level. 


Literacy Champions want to help improve literacy in their community. They could be a parent, business professional, teacher, student, sports coach or just passionate about making a difference in their local area. They can do this in many different ways depending on who they are and the communities they are living in and working with.


We have a dedicated Literacy Champions Project Manager based in Nottingham to work with volunteers, and community-based partners to support the development of ideas that will help improve literacy across the district.

Parent Champions are elected to act as representatives of the communities across SSBC wards (Aspley, Bulwell, Hyson Green & Arboretum and St Ann’s). They use their own personal experiences and knowledge of the experiences of other local families to help professionals understand and deliver what local families want and need. 


Alongside the SSBC team and ward delivery teams, Parent Champions help identify how local early years services are performing in their area. They build strong and lasting relationships with members of the community, the SSBC team and Early years workforce.

If you are interested in becoming a Literacy Champion, please visit the National Literacy Trust website, or contact Lynne at [email protected].

For more volunteering opportunities across this city, you can contact the Volunteer Centre at Nottingham Community and Voluntary Service (NCVS), who have a constantly changing online database of volunteering opportunities. For more information, get in touch with Dave Thomas, Volunteering Development Officer at [email protected] or on 07564 040767.

Download Event Pack
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