Voluntary Arts Ambassador Training

Well hello there lovely readers!
Heads up, this is a particularly long flibberty-gibbit from me :D

So you might remember some time ago I mentioned a secret I had that I couldn't tell anyone? A new volunteer project which could not be divulged? Well, now is the time to 'VULGE!

In November I had an interview with Voluntary Arts Scotland (from now on known under the cunning guise of VA Scotland) to be a Voluntary Arts Ambassador, and I was successful. The whole thing was to be unconfirmed until I did my training, and that happened last week in the lovely wee town of Larbert in Falkirk.

VA Scotland is an organisation which aims to promote participation in voluntary arts and crafts as well as support existing groups to develop and expand. They also work hard to generate respect for and recognition of the important and valuable contribution voluntary arts groups make. As a Voluntary Arts Ambassador my role will be to make links with voluntary arts groups in Aberdeen and find out what they are doing, what they aim for and how I can help. I can sign-post groups to VA resources such as Running Your Group, I am available for individuals to get in touch and find or discuss opportunities, and I am also working to build up a relationship with voluntary agencies where I want to represent the voice of local voluntary arts and crafts.

There was quite a gap between my interview in November and the training in March, and that together with the fact that this last few months has been such a whirlwind - final year at uni (ONLY 51 DAYS LEFT!), researching and developing the Skirts & Tales project, being involved in the Dance and Celtic Societies, and more recently applying for jobs and internships - meant that I'd not had much chance to get excited about being a VAA. BOOM new story now! Meeting all the other VAAs and getting more idea of what we'd be doing and how to go about it has got me uber excited!

I left a pretty miserable Deen-land at about 2.30 on Thursday on a west-bound train. I should point out I'm notoriously terrible at directions and travelling, and, true to form, at 2.31 when the conductor read out the list of train stops and Larbert wasn't one of them I heaved a giant sigh of "really, again?"-ness that came all the way from my feet to my gob. All was cleared up though when I asked the conductor wifee why my stop wasn't available, and she revealed to me there was a change-over at Stirling. Well, actually, she gave me a look that said "how can you not already know this?", and THEN she told me there was a change-over at Stirling. I'm well used to that look though.

So anyway, fast forward and I made it all the way to Larbert without any further blips at about 5pm, where I was met by Carol and Gillian from VA Scotland and they helped me back to Carronvale House. After dumping my bag in my room I headed downstairs to meet the rest of the VAA team and get a cuppa, and we had a half hour or so of getting to know each other before dinner. I got to sit at the cool table for the first time ever and got some hot tips from Social Media expert Fin Wycherley, and then we filtered back to the lounge area for some more of Fin's wisdom in the form of our Social Media training. I have to say I was impressed! As someone who spends a shameful amount of time on Facebook I still learned a lot from Fin's presentation, and I've been managing to drop little nuggets of internet wisdom here and there to my friends and now they think I'm all techno and with it. Innit blud?

After Fin's excellent talk we had a fantastic little pub quiz, at which I managed to fail all questions relating to Scotland but know all the Scandinavian ones (little Swedish fan girl...), and I use the word "fantastic" because MY TEAM WON, WOO! 13 out of 18 and a clear victory. And we won chocolates, although I'd made my way through quite a few quality streets and a 2 course meal prior to that so it was something of a bittersweet victory. There was also wine on the go by this point too, and knowing my unpredictable reaction to alcohol (sometimes I can drink 25 jagerbombs and still manage to spell brobdingnagian, and other times I'll have half a glass of wine with lunch and still be drunk 2 days later) (I have never actually drank 25 jagerbombs), I decided to have a small glass of rose, just to be sociable. I failed in my attempt to keep it minimal though, when the "tiny bit" left in the bottle I chose turned out to be quite a lot, and I ended up wandering about with a glass so big the ladies from Ab Fab would have been proud of it. By this time the evening had taken a more casual turn, and people began to head to bed or continued to mingle, and I met three excellent VAAs in Nigel, Rosa and Brian - although by the time One Direction came on the radio I decided it was bed time.

See? Same hair and everything!

The next day was the main bulk of the training. We started with an introduction to VA Scotland and to being a Voluntary Arts Ambassador, which I have tried to re-cap for you above, and then there was an introduction to TSIs and Community Planning. This is where I started to be able to tease out the real nitty gritty of the job. I'm going to call it a job because pretending I have a job makes me feel better, ok? This was a great grounding in the voluntary sector, which, in case you didn't know, is where I want to be!! We got a little background on TSIs and how they were formed from various Volunteer Centres, CVSs and Social Enterprise Networks within a region, and also heard a bit about the resources, training, meeting rooms, opportunities and support TSIs provide. I already had some experience of my own TSI, ACVO, having approached them about the Saltire Award for Volunteering as well as using their phone to do the VAA interview. I always come out of the ACVO office feeling encouraged and armed with the information I went in for, and the staff are chatty and welcoming, so I feel much more confident about working with them in my role as VAA. Coincidentally, as a little side note, the hours I spent doing the VAA training actually took me up to a spookily accurate 200 hours on my Saltire Award, so I have applied for that and will hopefully have the certificate soon! Now I just need to reach 500 before I'm 25 and I'll have the full set...

The Community Planning introduction was useful too. When I was in high school I was really closely involved in an after school community group called the Community Partner's Programme, so to me, that's what CPP is. Its going to take me a while to get used to Community Planning Partnership, especially when they're so close! I'm going to do a blog on the CPP (my CPP) sometime soon actually - I've been applying for jobs these last few weeks and I'm discovering that even after four or five years, the skills and knowledge I learned from those groups is still proving to be invaluable. Its also helped me see how closely ingrained on my soul community issues are - the CPP and certain wonderful people I met through it have actually made and continue to make a phenomenal impact on my life. Its funny that it took me so long to work out what I should do with my life when now it seems inevitable that I'd end up in Community Education of some form or other. I guess it was all part of the process though! So, to return to CPP of a similar but different variety, the training highlighted how this works in relation to our roles - we heard about network forums and how TSIs have a seat in these. The aim of a VAA is to be also invited to the forums, so we can represent the voluntary arts sector and also help the real CPP people recognise how voluntary arts helps them to achieve their Single Outcomes.

 ...I really hope I said all that right, or I'm going to sound like a right booby.

I should really thank my friend for sending me this photo. He was being facetious but actually its very useful!

So I came away from these introductions with several pages of notes, musings, do-to's and explanations of anagrams - HUNDREDS of anagrams! CPP, SCVO, TSIs, VOCAL, if I remember them all it'll be a miracle! I keep re-reading my notes and every time I do I find something new to remember. We then had a quick lunch break of some lemon meringue pie...I think there was some real food in there too but I only remember there definitely being pie, and then we spent the afternoon preparing a little presentation. We were to imagine being at a network forum meeting and having 2 minutes to explain our role and why we were there. Two minutes is not long!! I made a little re-cap video of our project for the Skirts & Tales team yesterday - all I had to do was give a brief summary of what has happened over the last couple of weeks and delegate some tasks to be done over the next fortnight, and it came to eleven minutes! So to sum everything up in two was a challenge. I didn't manage either, I was cut short by Gillian and a giant knitted letter 'S'. Art folks.

And that was pretty much it for the VAA training! We had a few more minutes to ask questions, and then we signed contracts and came up with our 3 'next steps,' which I've not been able to finish properly because of essays. I'm fairly sure essay writing creates a giant black hole in the atmosphere into which all time is sucked and vanishes forever. But that might not be scientifically accurate.

Just FYI I was actually trying not to make any bad space jokes this time round! Sorry.

And on that intergalactic note, I shall stop talking. As usual LEAVE ME A COMMENT, I love to read them, and get in touch via google+ or twitter @NaomiBegg1.

Over and out,
Love to everyone!
Naomi