Knowing Your Rural Social Value Project

We are looking for Rural Groups to Volunteer to be a part of the project!

The project will assist 6 individual organisations to measure the impact of their work via a number of support structures, namely:

• a facilitated support group that will meet quarterly,
• regular one-to-one mentoring from RCN staff to assist groups in capturing essential information about the impact of their work within their local areas,
• providing 12 months access to the “Social Value Engine”, an online toolkit to help groups carry out this work within their own setting.
• a final report outlining the effectiveness of your organisation/group within the local community.

The Social Value Engine has been developed by Rose Regeneration and East Riding of Yorkshire Council over the last 5 years and has been piloted by 25+ public bodies and voluntary & community sector organisations in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It provides a systemised and academically robust assessment of social value, in monetary terms, that groups can use to forecast, plan and evaluate their activities, as well as providing a description of how the work being undertaken by the group illustrates value for money.

Essentially it allows the groups to measure the impact of their work themselves & within their own group without the need of external assistance and thereby saving costs. This is the part that excites RCN most. Our friends in Rose Regeneration have shown through their work that this process does away for the need for costly external assessment processes and puts the groups firmly in charge of using the toolkit to best suit their needs and those of their funders.  You can find out more about the Social Value Engine by visiting their website http://socialvalueengine.com/

Not only will groups get access to the Social Value Engine. They will take part in Quarterly Project Meetings to discuss effective ways of measuring the effectiveness of their work (travel costs included), receive up to 10 hours mentoring support by RCN staff around measuring the effectiveness of their work, and will receive an individualised report on the impact of their work at the end of the project that they can use to promote and highlight their work as well as accompany any future funding applications.

If your organisation is interested in being one of these 6 groups, you are invited to submit an Expression of Interest to participate. To receive this and find out more about the project, give Conor a ring on 028 8676 6670 or email [email protected]