Shotts Community Priorities highlights 25/26

Members of the Community Partnership Team had been approached about delivering a workshop to four groups of S6 students. After a discussion, the CPOs designed a workshop which not only highlighted the work and role of the Community Partnership Team within the council but also the Local Development Programme. These workshops gave the opportunity for the Community Partnership Team to engage with young people.

The youth engagement workshops achieved a range of outcomes, not only to benefit the learning of young people, but also to promote the Community Partnership Team, Community Boards and Local Outcome Improvement Plans. The learning objectives met included:

• Raising general awareness of North Lanarkshire Partnership Community Boards and Local Outcome Improvement Plan Priorities, for Wishaw and Shotts.
• Raising general awareness of the Community Partnership Team.
• Raising awareness of the Local Development Programme (LDP) and how they can be involved.
• Learning the process and steps taken in the Local Development Programme (LDP) including Feasibility checks, Consultation and Procurement.
• Interactive learning of the who to consult with and how to consult with specific types of projects and groups of people.
• Thinking of specific ideas for potential future projects in their own areas.

Involving young people in decision making processes, enabling them to participate, and learn empowers them to participate and contribute to community planning decisions, as young people are the future of our communities. 

During the workshop sessions, some fantastic ideas for LDP projects were suggested by young people. These inform the Community Partnership Team of useful ideas and, what is important to young people. Some of the ideas gathered from the workshops include:

• More Nature trails and local greenspaces.
• Improve nature trails, for example update Perchy Pond by including interactive educational signs.
• Plant more trees and flowers.
• Improve and upgrade current parks and play areas.
• More planned murals to deter graffiti.
• More add on facilities in new MUGAs, for example retractable nets to allow for other sports to be played like pickleball, volleyball, tennis and badminton; hooks for hoodies; USB ports for charging phones; running tracks around MUGAs.
• More CCTV particularly in areas where young people frequent in the interests of safety.
• Increased and improved facilities in areas where needed, particularly those with new housing developments, for example transport (train stations), shops, leisure.
• More public toilets.
• More Astro Turf pitches.
• More parking due to young people learning to drive and an increase of cars.

These highlight key areas to focus on for young people. Due to an understanding of the Community Board structure, they were able to set out design ideas for promotional materials which would highlight the Community Boards but be more youth friendly. They also discussed making videos to share good practice which could be shown at Community Board meetings.