Plan a community impact event

You’ll need

A4 paper
Pens or pencils

Before you begin

Before you do this activity, do at least one of the other ‘Plan action’ activities for the ‘Supporting refugees and displaced children’ theme.

Remember the activity

The person leading the activity should ask if anyone can remember the other ‘Plan action’ activity they’ve already done.
Someone should recap the activity so it’s fresh in everyone’s memories (and anyone who wasn’t there can catch up).
Everyone should talk with the people near them about what they learned in the activity. They should think about what other people might need to know about the theme.
Once they’ve had some time to chat, everyone should take it in turns to feed back. Everyone should try and find one key message they want to tell other people.

Plan the event

Everyone should work together to think about how they may plan an event in their local community. Everyone will need to be patient, and listen to all the ideas, before they start narrowing it down.
Once everyone has a brief outline, they should work together to think about the details. They should agree on a purpose, some ideas for venues, and a date, and a budget. Everyone should also agree what people will do, whether they’ll provide anything like food, and who’ll run the activities and event.
Once everyone’s clear, they should split into smaller groups to work on final details. One group, for example, could research potential venues and their availability, while another could develop a craft or menu.

This activity helps contribute towards some of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals. Find out more about the SDGs, and how Scouts across the world are getting involved.

Reflection

This activity needed everyone to be a team player. Some of the bigger decisions needed to be made as a team – why did so much need to be agreed before people separated? People could think about what might’ve happened otherwise – maybe there would be too many guests for the venue, or someone may spend the entire food budget on craft materials! Did people find it challenging to stick to the big decisions when planning the details in their group?

This activity was also a chance for everyone to help their community by taking an active role. What does everyone want people to think, feel, and do after the event? Why not write these goals down and keep them visible when planning? Think about who’ll benefit from the event – the people who attend will benefit from learning, but refugees and displaced children may also benefit from people knowing more.

Safety

All activities must be safely managed. You must complete a thorough risk assessment and take appropriate steps to reduce risk. Use the safety checklist to help you plan and risk assess your activity. Always get approval for the activity, and have suitable supervision and an InTouch process.