Our Community
We know it is vital for us to keep an open dialogue and listening ear with our friends and neighbours. To that end Rachel Williams our Community Outreach Officer has been busy getting out and about in the community talking to people and talking about our work and organising Community Conversation events.
Community Conversations
We have now held several quarterly Community Conversation events and it has been really encouraging to see so many people come along. The format is a short presentation followed by round-table discussions, which gives everyone time to ask questions and leads to some really lively debate.
If you are not able to attend in person you can follow our updates and send us questions online via Twitter and Facebook
For more information about our Community Conversations contact Rachel Williams our Community Outreach Officer – rachel.williams@dartington.org or 01803 847017.
Previous Community Conversations
February 2013 – Land Use Review, Bicton College and Community Supported Agriculture
A successful Open Space/Community conversation was held in Totnes on the 23rd February and it was great to see some 80 people from the local community turn up to take part. The morning session comprised an introduction to the day by Kate Hewett, the facilitator, a welcome and general update by Karen Williams, Chief Operating Officer at the Dartington Hall Trust and a update on progress made with the Land Use Review by John Channon, the Land Use Manager. David Henley, Principal of Bicton College outlined their plans for the future on the Dartington Estate and Jon Rae and Jane Townsend spoke of the educational collaboration between Schumacher College and Bicton College. Each table of participants were then asked to come up with five key questions for presenters. Questions focussed on Land Use Review, Bicton College, Dartington Hall Trust and Community involvement and Education. The afternoon sessions focussed on Community Supported Agriculture and Holly Tiffen from TTT and Melissa Harvey from the CSA farm at School Farm on the Dartington Estate asked the question: What do you, the community, want from Community Supported Agriculture?
Click here for the notes from this meeting including Q&As
October 2012 – Dartington Finances & Schumacher College
Karen Williams, our Director of Resources, lead a discussion on Dartington’s finances, and Jon Rae, Head of Schumacher College, gave an update on latest developments at the College.
July 2012 – Dartington LandWorks
Our July community conversation was an opportunity to find out about Dartington LandWorks, a project in development that is designed to help ex-offenders stabilise their lives by providing them with the skills, training and support to find employment. Director of Social Justice at Dartington, Celia Atherton, was joined by project co-ordinators Steve Bradford, Carl Byrne and Chris Parsons. For information on the project, please see the LandWorks web pages.
January 2012 – The Arts at Dartington
At the January Community Conversation David Francis, Director of the Arts at Dartington, shared his plans. This was followed by a short presentation from Ursula Crickmay about community participation in arts activities at Dartington. Following these presentations, Robyn Brown, Regional General Manager for South Devon at the National Trust spoke briefly of their plans for High Cross House, which will open to the public on the 7th March 2012. For the presentations and Q&As from this meeting click here.
October 2011 – Land Use Review
The Community Conversation held in October focussed on an update of the proposed community projects within the Land Use Review (LUR) and proposals for public access to the estate. John Channon, who heads up the LUR for Dartington Hall, spoke to those present about the LUR prior to the draft proposal going to Dartington Hall Trustees in December. The evening was held in the Main Hall of the ‘old’ Craft Education Centre at Schumacher College and was very well attended by over 70 people. It was a most successful evening with many good ideas generated and useful comments made by the community. Click here for Q & A’s from the event and Click here for the proposed plans.
July 2011 – Property related development
Jo Talling, Dartington’s Property Director, presented the Trust’s vision for future property-related development both on and off the estate. Download the presentation.
Dartington’s CEO, Vaughan Lindsay, shares our development vision in the blog section.
For details of the questions and answers from this event click here
Following on from the July Community Conversation the inaugural Forum meeting for proposed development at Sawmills Field & Webbers Yard Regeneration took place in September 2011. For all information relating to the proposed development please click here.
Keep in touch
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Volunteering
We have a variety of charitable programmes which are kindly assisted by volunteers. If you are interested in volunteering for Dartington click here to visit the volunteering page and check out what opportunities are available. Thank you!