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In front of a grey sky, a big mountain and lots of green trees. Over all of this is a rainbow shimmering in red, yellow, green, blue and violet.

Showing our colours in June: monthly team update

June 1, 2022

June brings us more sunlight than any other month, and many opportunities to fly the flag of co-production. Internationally, this month commemorates the Stonewall riots of 1969, a landmark of community power reminding us of the importance of standing up to barriers to social reform. As 2022 is nearly half-way through, we will be even more focused on our efforts to create lasting change within and beyond our community. To quote one of our co-producers from a co-creation session last week, we need to continue to “fight for what’s right, and that means putting lived experience in the centre of everything”.

Team news

Our biggest news of the month is that we have a new team member joining us, supporting our partnership with NHS England and NHS Improvement. We are thrilled to welcome Chloe, our new Co-Production Manager and hope you all will have a chance to say hello soon. In the meantime, below is a quick hello from Chloe herself:

Hi, I’m Chloe. I’m so pleased to have started at the Co-Production Collective as a Co-production Manager! I first became interested in co-production when I worked with the mental health charity Mind on a consultation with my local clinical commissioning group. Since then, I’ve been working in the health and social care sector at organisations that really value co-production be it in publishing, frontline work, children’s special educational needs services, or patient-led media. I grew up in London but now live in Brighton, where I spend lots of time hanging out with my cat and my little chihuahua. I’m into all things veganism as well as ethical consumerism and sustainability, and absolutely love all animals.

Unfortunately, Lizzie will sadly be leaving the team at the beginning of July to take up a new role at Innovation Unit. We’ll share more about this in the coming weeks, but rest assured she intends to remain a fully involved member of the Co-Pro community so won’t be going far.

In other good news, Rory will now be our Project Co-ordinator five days a week! Previously, she was splitting her week between our team and the Patient and Public Involvement team at the Biomedical Research Centre of UCLH, but we’re very lucky to be able to have her full-time from June, to focus entirely on the Collective.

If that wasn’t enough, we also have a job opportunity! We’re looking for a Co-production Partnerships Manager to develop the Co-Production Collective associate programme (a working title whilst we co-create this as a community) and manage our projects with partners. The role is until the end of December 2022 in the first instance and the deadline to apply is Friday 10 June. Interested? Find out more in our blog and get in touch!

What else is going on this month?

Starting strong, the co-creation of our Associates model is kicking off, with three sessions scheduled for 13, 15, and 30 June - all completely fully booked! There are waiting lists so please do add your name if you’re interested and we’ll release places if and when they become available.

We could not be more excited to get stuck in with this new piece of co-production, right after last month’s session focusing on our Journey of Change. This was the second session, thinking about the positive changes we want to create as Co-Production Collective, and how we might get there. We made real progress and once we’ve had chance to read through and digest it all, we’ll share back a summary version with you for further feedback and development. It’s called a journey for a reason!

If June is already here, that means Co-production Week 2022 is on the horizon. To mark the occasion and to gain insight into different types of co-production, we’re looking for members of our community to represent Co-Production Collective on 5 July at the Not Another Co-production Festival, and on 7 July at the People’s Voice Media Community Reporter Conference 2022, both in Manchester. The deadline for expressions of interest is Friday 10 June. For more information and to apply, have a look at our recent blog.

As ever, we’re also doing lots of work alongside partners across research, policy and services. In June, that includes Bridges Self Management, Joined Up Care Derbyshire, National Academy of Social Prescribing, and UCL Grand Challenges, as well as continuing activity on our Value of Co-Production project.

Get involved

To stay in touch with the latest news from us, make sure you’re signed up to our newsletter and following us on Twitter to hear it first. We hope to see you, hear from you or speak to you soon! As ever, if you have any questions or suggestions for us, please get in touch at coproduction@ucl.ac.uk

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