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Co-designing a greener, fairer and stronger community for children’s wellbeing,

Khan, Matluba ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5546-1870, Smith, Thomas ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7221-1868 and Harris, Neil ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4087-1698 2022. Co-designing a greener, fairer and stronger community for children’s wellbeing,. [Online]. SALUS - Global Knowledge Exchange website: SALUS. Available at: https://salus.global/article-show/co-designing-a-g...

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Abstract

Measures enacted to respond to the Covid-19 pandemic, including social distancing, school closures, and the prohibition on outdoor activities, have accentuated social and spatial inequalities, particularly for children and young people (CYP). The experiences of CYP living in overcrowded households, in high-rise flats, and those with no access to gardens and with limited/no access to the internet are evidently not the same as children living in a spacious household with access to ICT, a private garden, and a high-quality park. Evidence suggests there will be long-term detrimental effects of the pandemic on CYP’s health and wellbeing1. Communities will need a recovery plan for coming together and regenerating outdoor sociability and green-space access for children and young people. Cardiff University has partnered with the Child-Friendly Cardiff Team of Cardiff Council, Community Gateway, Grange Pavilion and Grange Pavilion Youth Forum, to work with children and young people from Grangetown, a community in the centre of Cardiff. Their aim is to co-produce a greener, fairer and child-friendly recovery plan through a series of workshops involving creative methods. Activities are conducted in four distinct phases: 1. co-assessment of neighbourhood quality through application of creative methods, such as mapping, drawing and child-led photo-walks, and which also includes an exploration of children’s feelings and emotions as to how the pandemic-associated responses have affected their daily lives; 2. co-creation of a phased recovery strategy through model-making, with methods adapted to be age-appropriate; 3. co-building of one element from the recovery strategy with direct participation of CYP; and, lastly 4. co-creation of an accessible toolkit for planners with inputs from CYP, reflecting the learnings from earlier phases. The activities were conducted between March and June 2022, and this paper will share the findings from the first two phases of co-assessment of neighbourhood and co-creation of the phased recovery strategy. Preliminary evaluations of the data reveal that the pandemic has disrupted children’s social network, leading to feelings of sadness, anger, boredom, frustration and being ‘stuck’. In the midst of uncertainties, some children perceived ‘home’ as a safe place, while some others found a visit to the local park ‘calming’. However, children also identified local parks as featureless, where there are ‘not many things to do’. Children’s ideas for a Grangetown to grow up in can be grouped into four themes: clean and safe; playful; green; and inclusive. A draft recovery plan for a child-friendly community has been developed, which will include recommendations that can be applied in other communities in Cardiff, and throughout and beyond the UK.

Item Type: Website Content
Date Type: Published Online
Status: Published
Schools: Geography and Planning (GEOPL)
Publisher: SALUS
Date of Acceptance: 15 December 2022
Last Modified: 02 Feb 2023 11:30
URI: https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/155468

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