The goal of the project
The aim of the project is to activate local communities to include the perspective of children and young people in the process of transforming the space of their neighbourhoods in areas designated for urban renewal. The project implementation and reflection on the actions taken within it will allow for the improvement of "small renewal of backyards" – a socio-pedagogical model of action prototyped as an example of "meanwhile uses" addressed to the spaces and residents of the neighbourhoods of areas designated for regeneration as part of large-budget urban renewal.
The project is a response to the low level of participation of residents (especially the youngest ones) of the neighbourhood of degraded areas in the design of renewal changes affecting their living environments, as well as the deepening processes of their territorial stigmatisation, including those promoting the image of residents as reluctant to act for positive changes in the immediate environment.
From the point of view of social pedagogy, which determines the premises of the carried out activities, it is important for the initiators of the project to abolish the divisions evaluating the city's residents into "better" and "worse" by organizing in such places conditions for discovering and activating local human and social forces in order to transform living conditions, with particular emphasis on the needs and potentials of children and young people. The changes in local living environments that empower them have an educational purpose. Co-creating small changes in the place of residence prepares young people living in Lodz to exercise agency in matters that really concern them, which can be seen as prevention of social reproduction and a method of education for active citizenship.
The project assumes the implementation of the "small renewal of backyards" model, which includes a three-way process (residents, academy, non-governmental organisation) of co-creating a place of life in three tenement house neighbourhoods in Lodz.
The course of the project
Three neighbourhoods have been diagnosed so far in order to determine the needs of the young generation and identify forces ready to participate in creating the conditions for their fulfilment. They constitute a starting point for further cooperation with and with a partner organisation specializing, among other things, in supporting local communities in the implementation of neighbourhood initiatives.
The diagnoses that were carried out also enabled the development of the concept of "small renewal" – a socio-pedagogical model of action in the neighbourhoods of post-industrial cities, saturating it with the premises developed during the project for its implementation in new types of neighbourhoods. In the spring of 2024, it is planned to return to the area of the selected neighbourhoods to take specific actions aimed at implementing pre-designed socio-spatial changes.
About the projet
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Title of the project: Small Renewal of Backyards
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Supervision: Dr Anita Gulczyńska, Department of Social Pedagogy and Resocialization of the University of Lodz
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Students: Aleksandra Prokopczyk, Preschool and Early School Pedagogy, Oliwia Milaszewska, Pedagogy
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Partner: Opus Promotion and Development of Civic Initiatives Centre
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Project: The project is addressed to children and young people from the neighbourhoods of degraded areas (SOZ) in Lodz, intended for renewal. Research indicates a low level of participation of residents of such places in renewal processes. They reveal overt and hidden reasons (e.g. gentrification) and consequences (deepening territorial stigma, social reproduction of obedient recipients, not co-creators of changes in the city) of the phenomenon. Young residents of such areas experience particular marginalisation in this process. They are excluded from participation in community gatherings (Fitzpatrick et al. 2000), and their social class (euphemistically referred to as "low educational attainment") and the status given to all adolescents as "people in the process of becoming" make it easy to define them as incapable of deciding (Phillips 2004). From the point of view of pedagogy, it is important to abolish the divisions evaluating citizens into "better" and "worse" and to empower young residents of SOZ in the processes of co-creating the city in order to prevent social reproduction and educate for active citizenship. The goals of the project are as follows:
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empowering children and youth from SOZ in renewal processes;
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improvement of the model created by the University of Lodz employees during the implementation in new neighbourhoods
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establishing cooperation with a partner with a strong position among entities participating in social renewal in Lodz
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Source: Project team
Edit: Science Hub of the University of Lodz