A new network of community champions has been created to spread the message of stronger, more cohesive communities.
Members of the police, probation, local authorities and Government were among those to graduate from De Montfort University Leicester (DMU)’s Building Stronger Communities programme, led by Kim Sadique.
Using the Bosnian genocide as a focus, participants learn through survivor testimony, lectures, blogs, podcasts and discussions with the aim to take positive action against prejudice and intolerance.
“We are very proud to have the Building Stronger Communities programme at DMU. I have watched the project for a number of years now, and it does some incredible things,” said Dr Mark Charlton, Associate Director of Sustainable Development at DMU.
Building Stronger Communities is run with the support of charity Remembering Srebrenica which was created to tackle intolerance in the aftermath of the genocide. In July 1995, more than 8,000 Bosniak Muslims were murdered in Srebrenica, in the worst atrocity on European soil since the Second World War.
Kim, who led on developing the programme, said a key outcome of the work done by the students was to each come up with a positive sustainable action they could commit to individually as a result of the course.
She said: “Everyone who comes on this programme makes a pledge to commit to taking action. We want to see the actions build up past the life of the course and to be something that all our participants continue to engage with.
“Everyone here has worked so hard, alongside their regular jobs, and engaged with what could be very challenging materials. It is worth it to hear how this has made them think differently about how they can bring the lessons from this course into their daily lives as change makers.”
Certificates were presented to Arabella Coombes, Leigh Broxton, Adeeb Redman, Andrew Jeffreys, Erin Parker-Leonard, Mark Wilson, Tom Lester, Victoria Jones and Joanna Luck.
Tom Lester, a special constable, said: “It has been so impactful it really left me with lots of different emotions. My motivation was how can I do better in the communities that I serve as a special with the police, and I have taken so much from this.”
Lisa Close, former graduate of DMU and currently a part-time hourly member of staff in the community justice team and Melisa Mujkanovic, lecturer in Criminology, course tutor on Building Stronger Communities and survivor from Kozarac, Bosnia, paid tribute to Kim for her work in setting up and delivering the powerful programme.
Erin read a poem written by her father Tony Parker, who was a miner in Newcastle, when he visited Bosnia as part of an aid mission in 1995. Miners in Tuzla, Bosnia, put aside their wages to donate to striking miners in the UK during the 1980s and when the Bosnian War broke out, miners in the North East delivered aid and organised a convoy of help.
She said: “In a way this has been a link back to my dad who is no longer with us, it has been nice to have that connection. Dad was the co-ordinator for the Workers’ Aid for Bosnia and we grew up in Heaton which had a large Bosnian community so this has been very personal for me.”
Another police special Arabella said: “I was ex air force and when I joined in 1998 so I was aware of people who had been out there. Because of the age I was at the time, though, it hadn’t really sunk in what had happened and that was very tough to hear and learn about on the course.”
The programme has been supported as part of DMU’s work as a United Nations hub for SDG 16 – peace, justice and strong communities.
Posted on Wednesday 12 July 2023