Community Expert Podcast

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Steve, After retiring, ( very early !!) , from a career in business which had made it difficult for him to get involved in social and community events, is catching up now with a vengeance. A really special trait of Steve’s is his super positive attitude - where he says "Yes Let's give it a go" to just about any opportunity offered to him. This approach has led to some quite unexpected outcomes, such as a spell training with the UK Tug Of War team, and a second career as a local radio presenter. However it is the role as Chair of the Locker School Prep Parents Association, for the last four years, which now brings most satisfaction.

What is so interesting about Steve's story is how he built so many strong relationships with his community. He describes how he has built a good relationship with the Head and school staff including catering and the school grounds team. Another great lesson is how he focused on specific groups to bring them into the fold. Such as creating a Dad's Escape Group. Hosting fun events for dads that made them feel like the parent association was for them and subsequently encouraged them to step up and take on more responsibilities including becoming Class Reps and Committee members.

In this episode you will learn:

How did Steve enter the wonderful world of Parent Associations?
How did Steve's team innovate during lockdown to create innovative 'drive through' events to ensure participants had fun and were safe?
Tips for recruiting a more diverse mix of volunteers and committee members.
Advice on how to run a festival, the key ingredients and recommended pricing of tickets.

Favourite book and podcast:

Sapiens: A brief history of Humankind, by Yuval Noah Harari
Podcasts by 92.6FM Radio Verulam

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Councillor Sharad Kumar Jha Sharad is a company director based in Buckinghamshire. He advises and consults in human resources, communications and public relations. Sharad is highly involved in his community. He is a trustee of the Shree Jagannatha Society UK. He was Vice Chair Primary Education UK and is a true global citizen, speaking over a dozen languages.

In addition to his day job he is also responsible for event management and guest relations for the Dr Challoner's High School Parent Association. Where he has twin daughters attending.

In this episode you will learn:

How and why Sharad entered the wonderful world of parent associations?
What techniques Sharad uses to attract more parents to participate - especially dads?
An innovative way of fundraising by combining a social gathering with an investor pitch deck style presentation conducted by the pupils. Raising money, developing pupil entrepreneur skills plus all those involved having fun.

Favourite book:

Biographies
Books written by Daniel Goleman

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Jen Walker is one of those fantastic individuals who we all need in our lives - a doer. When she isn’t undertaking the role as Chair of the St Edwards School, Oxford, Friends Association, she runs two companies: The Hat Hire company and The Cattleshed Candle Company. She’s also a microgreen farmer and organiser of the Launton Artisan Food Market.

A key theme that comes across regarding all her endeavours is a desire to build community. Whether it's in her local village organising various food producers for the market or in her children’s schools. Where she arranged memorable end of year balls and more recently virtual magician shows. Jen is a natural leader. Having led associations now at primary and secondary schools.

What is so interesting about her story is how she adapted the St Edwards school community to online so effectively during Covid. A key takeaway from this podcast is how she transitioned Friends events away from a few blockbuster events to a programme of more regular more intimate gatherings. Experimenting with different themes to reach out to a wider audience. Engagement levels increased significantly during this time. Effective team work with key school staff is another key takeaway. Her experience really contrasts with so many schools who we’ve observed here at Classlist that mothballed their events in the last year. Without further ado here is Jen’s story of being at the helm during the pandemic.

In this episode you will learn:

How did Jen enter the wonderful world of Friend Associations?
How did Jen pivot your community in light of lockdown and Covid?
In-person vs online events what are the pros and cons?
What tips can Jen give about running online events?
What have been Jen's 3 proudest achievements?
Jen's tips regarding forming a positive partnership with the school?

Favourite book and favourite podcast:

Close to Home, By author Cara Hunter
Tracing Your Roots, BBC, Radio 4 Podcast

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Jimi heads up the Dalai Lama Centre for Compassion’s educational outreach. Compassion Matters. Org. Jimi and his team support the teaching of ethics and moral philosophy in schools. Using a framework they have designed which covers important themes. For instance happiness; courage; justice; bravery and resilience. The end result - children who complete the course are better prepared to think about ethical issues, make positive changes to themselves and above all be more compassionate. And happier.

In this podcast Jimi and I discuss the importance of community. How important it is to belong. How it’s a basic human need that is core to our happiness and well being. As we emerge from lockdown over the next couple of months. We are going to have to rebuild our school communities that have been frankly a bit neglected the past year. Jimi is here to discuss his work in schools, his thoughts on belonging and why compassion matters. Including:

How did you come up with the idea of Compassion Matters?
How did you and your team build trust with school leaders? What tactics did they deploy?
How have you adapted to the different challenges during school lockdown?
Where do you see the future of Compassion Matters?
In light of remote learning, how will this impact your plans to educate pupils about compassion in the future?

Jimi's favourite books and podcasts?

Ordinary Magic- Resilience in Development
Podcast- Grief Cast with Carriad Lloyd
Podcast - First Person Plural
The compassion project- Dr Julian Abel
Born to be good: The science of a meaningful life - Dacher Keltner

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Dixie is a former Accenture management consultant. Dixie was a committee member of the Overseas Women's Club in Bangalore, India which was instrumental in welcoming new expats as well as raising substantial funds for numerous good causes. After returning to the UK she became a rep and then Parent Association Chair of her daughters’ school St Albans High School for Girls. Her first task as Chair was to establish the purpose of her Parent Association which was set around three C’s community collaboration and celebration. Dixie also describes how her and the team manage their school's uniform shop, which is an important source of funds. Plus how her association manages a number of highly popular events including a comedy night and the end of year ball.

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This episode's guest is Agness O'Brien, Chair of the PTFA at Colchester County High School for Girls. Agness has headed up the PTFA for 4 years and during this time, has dramatically increased the funds raised and parent engagement.

More recently Agness has added to her portfolio an employed role at her school as a Development Officer. She is also the founder of a very successful Facebook Community that provides free resources for parents and students preparing for the entrance exams for grammar and independent schools, SATs, GCSE & A-levels. Needless to say, education and parent communities is at the heart of everything she does.

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Jennifer Harrell, held a career in finance and consulting sales before becoming a global nomad. She has lived in parts of South America, France and for the past four years in the UK. With each expat posting she has had to start again. Relocating, making new friends and settling her kids into new educational systems. It was her positive experience of settling into Southbank International school in London, that inspired her to help others and to take on a community leadership role as PTA Vice President and Secretary. As you will hear in this podcast, Jennifer and her committee have grown a truly thriving and inclusive school community.

In this podcast you will learn:

How Jennifer entered the wonderful world of PTAs and volunteering
How Jennifer's expat experience influenced her?
What were Jennifers biggest learnings about building and sustaining a community?
What is the optimal balance between offline and online community building?
What have been Jennifer's proudest achievements?

Jennifer’s favourite book and favourite podcast:

Avid follower of NPR and Radio Lab
Intelligence Squared: Queen Elizabeth 1 vs Queen Victoria, with Daisy Goodwin and Philippa Gregory

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Charlotte worked in Broadcast and Digital Media for over 20 years, including Sky, C4 and Virgin Media. Where she helped launch the first ever live streams from the Big Brother house. Charlotte has teenage children and three years ago she took on the role of PTA Chair at Latymer Upper School in West London. It is here that she launched Classlist to great success.

In addition to continuing to be a member of her PTA, she now works on the startup Terra Neutra which encourages others to live a more sustainable and lower carbon lifestyle.

In this podcast you will learn:

How did Charlotte build her school community from scratch?

What were Charlotte's biggest learnings about building and sustaining a community?

What is the optimal balance between offline and online community developments?

How did the Latymer PTA pivot their community in light of lockdown and Covid?

How has Charlotte developed her community management skills?

What have been her biggest lessons on what it takes to be a community leader?

Charlotte’s favourite book and favourite podcast:

Book "The Future We Choose: Surviving the Climate Crisis", by Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac
Podcast: By the same authors "Outrage and Optimism"

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Jinger Stevens is an experienced Information Technology practitioner. Not only does she have an incredible curiosity about others her claim to fame in terms of today’s podcast is she is a Classlist Ambassador that has set up three school communities. Covering a mix of schools. From her insights you can tell she brings all this amazing experience to bear. We hope you enjoy this podcast.