Ignite Chelmsford: One Year On | Marc De'Ath

Thanks to all who came out to A Canteen Thursday night, it was a special one! With a more relaxed and intimate feel than usual, a good 20 people huddled in on the sofas and chatted about what’s next for Ignite meet ups. It was great to brainstorm up ways that we can actively encourage and support one another in this growing community. The founding principles of Ignite are representing the collective needs, views and ideas. Conversations were flowing and loads of super useful ideas were mapped out on a big board we now have a list of venues to tap into and interesting topics to decide on from things like: Air bnb experiences, social entrepreneurship and safe spaces to name a few!

Questions on the board were around: future themes, skills we could share, support we may need and ideas for venues that we could explore. Suggestions for the ways in which we can support each other such as mentoring schemes, grant writing workshops, marketing and website building sessions were some of the great ways we could implement to actively encourage and support people to lead and take part, as well as develop their own skills.

When it came to thinking about new ideas nearly all the feedback said that the idea of live music and performances would be great to integrate into relevant nights. Other suggestions were things like having an Ignite Instagram to stay up to date and a Facebook group to drop ideas into.

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Marc is a founding member of Ignite Chelmsford and now works as Cultural Services Manager for Chelmsford City Council. He's passionate about ideas, collaboration, creativity, sustainability and social justice.