Polish Connection
Final Report: Polish Scottish Heritage Trail Project Polish Scottish Festival Association (PCFA)
OBJECTIVES The PCFA have received funding from Heritage Lottery Fund, Historic Scotland, Polish Consulate General of the Republic of Poland, Polish Cultural Institute and Polish Connection to develop and deliver the Polish Scottish Heritage Project. The project lasted from March 2013 till October 2014. In this short time we have collect and research information about people, events and places important to our joint history, interpret them and then present in an engaging way on our interactive website as well as created and delivered a diverse programme of educational and cultural events to support learning
and to give people the opportunity to understand and enjoy the value of the Polish- Scottish shared heritage whilst appealing to people of different ages and educational backgrounds, both Polish and Scottish. ACTIVITIES DELIVERED Stories of people, places and events of our joint history, interpreted and presented on our interactive website. We have identified - 31 sites of Polish Scottish importance - 26 sites in Scotland +5 In other parts of Europe and published 18 articles that provide information about important events, people and stories connected with the sites. All of the info is accessible through our website. http://polishscottishheritage.co.uk/ The article have been research and written by our Research Manager Jarek Gasiorek and number of contributors that have volounteered e.g; Iga Bozyk, Patrycja Godula, Kasia Kokowska, Ross'teffy' Craig, Dr. David Worthington, Jurek Puttner. Each article was promoted via our social media and material has been used to create fascinating exhibition Polish Scottish Heritage presented during in June's Polish Scottish Heritage, in October 2014 in Scottish Parliament as well as in Aberdeen and other places. All of the materials developed by the project are now present at our website.
www.polishscottishheritage.co.uk.According to our records (google analytics) the website has on average 750 unique users per month generating a total of 7500 people that view it from when it went live in November 2013.
Oral History training and podcast development - Sep 2013- Feb 2014 This activity aimed to discover, record and present stories of people important for our shared heritage. The project recruited 12 volunteers both Scottish and Polish nationals. The volunteers were tasked to research, interview and prepare a podcast telling a story of shared Polish heritage. The project have organised 2 training events;
16.09.2013 Oral History techniques- run by Living Memory Association in Edinburgh 05.10.2013 Podcast making techniques- run by Alan Boyed from Glasgow Caledonian University
Both training events were rated very highly by volunteers and provided them with necessary skills and support to create podcasts. 15 podcast were prepared presenting stories of people important to Polish Scottish heritage, who shared some amazing stories from their lives.
interviewee: Zosia Międzybrodzka interviewer: Radek Slomnicki edited: Radek Slomnicki
interviewee: Nina MacKinnon interviewer: Radek Slomnicki edited: Radek Slomnicki
interviewee: Bolesław Kozub interviewers: Radek Slomnicki & Jarek Gąsiorek voiceover: Radek Slomnicki edited: Radek Slomnicki & Alan Boyd
interviewees: Ida & Stefan Boroń interviewer: Anna Bijlsma edited: Alan Boyd
interviewee: Danuta StepekBieńkowska interviewer: Monica Brown edited: Monica Brown
interviewee: Kazimierz Durkacz interviewer: Radek Slomnicki voiceover: Radek Slomnicki edited: Radek Slomnicki & Alan Boyd
interviewee: Tomasz Ziarski interviewer: Kelly Johnson edited: Alan Boyd
interviewee: Dorothy NowakSolińska interviewer: Kat Turner edited: Radek Slomnicki
interviewee: Robert L. Hodgart interviewers: Gabrysia & Alex Ingle edited: Alex Ingle
interviewee: Lesley A. Duncan interviewers: Gabrysia & Alex Ingle edited: Alex Ingle
interviewee: Colin Kingsley interviewer: Olga Wojtas edited: Alan Boyd
interviewee: Blanka KlimczakPeters interviewer: Olga Wojtas edited: Radek Slomnicki
interviewee: Zenon Śliwiński interviewer: Agnieszka Świda voiceover: Kacper Łyszkiewicz edited: Kacper Łyszkiewicz
interviewee: Anna Frąckiewicz interviewer: Radek Slomnicki voiceover: Iga Bożyk edited: Radek Slomnicki & Alan Boyd
Furthermore, people interviewed by the volunteers were photographed by Radoslaw Slomnicki, creating a series of portraits that has been presented in a form of exhibition during the Polish Scottish Heritage Festival. All podcast are available through our website; www.polishscottishheritage.co.uk and on Polish Scottish Heritage Trail You Tube channel. The material developed by volunteers was presented to the public during the Polish Scottish Heritage Festival as a part of the Polish Scottish Heritage Exhibition created by the programme.
Photo: Blanka Peters
Photo: Lesley Duncan
Photo; Prof.Robert R Hodgart
Photo: Dr Colin Kinsley
''Festival of Polish-Scottish Heritage- 18-29th June 2014The festival aimed to raise awareness and explore 500 years of joint Polish-Scottish Heritage.
The programme of 22 events, was attended by 600 people of different ages, economic backgrounds and ethnicity. Some of the key events that took place included Polish Scottish Heritage exhibition, a concert by Katy Carr and the Aviators, Alexander Kudajczyk’s Chopin performance, thought provoking readings by Martin Stepek and Jenny Robertson and a lecture by Billy Kay. We had also celebrated our cultural overlap with an arts-and-crafts showcase, a Ceilidh with a Polish twist and delicious Polish Scottish fusion cuisine created especially for this occasion. The full programme of the events can be viewed at our website. I also attach an electronic copy for your archives. The Polish Scottish Heritage multimedia exhibition, was a result of the work that we have carried out throughout the project. The showcase included 10 A0 panels, 15 podcasts and photographic portraits and 7 documentaries, presenting stories of the people, places and events that shaped our shared heritage, as well as Pop-Up Library full of interesting books that have explored the topic. We have also prepared a short movie to showcase the highlights of the programme as well as trying to capture fantastic atmosphere created during the festival. During the key events we have carried out and recorded on video number of interviews with members of the audience to gather their thought and impressions. Recruited 15 volunteers have supported delivery of the festival. More of the photos and information about the festival can be accessed at our facebook page.
Polish Scottish Heritage Exhibition- Scottish Parliament
Lectures in Summerhall
Polish Scottish Heritage Exhibition in Summerhall
Polish Scottish Heritage Festival Team
h Ceilidh with Polish Twist- Polish Scottish Heritage
Polish Scottish Heritage Festival DAVNO
Sept 2013 - Sept 2014- ''Young Explorers’’- Polish-Scottish heritage workshops for kids Polish Scottish Heritage Outreach program envisaged development and delivery of three workshops for school age kids. The objective was to provide interactive, educational and enjoyable activities raising awareness of the shared Polish Scottish heritage. Workshops development: Three themes most suitable to capture imagination of younger audiences have been chosen to provide focus for the workshops these included: 1. Meet Wojtek the bear soldier (age group: 5–7 years old) Interactive storytelling and dressing real size cardboard Wojtek exploring the story of the bear soldier before and during his life in Scotland 2. Making a mini Great Polish Map of Scotland (age group 10-12 years old) Creative activity of sculpting a mini version of the biggest 3D map of Scotland made by Polish Geographers in Eddlestone. 3. Let’s dance Polonaise workshop (age group: 7–9 years old) Learning about Chopin’s music and links with Scotland culminated with joint polonaise dance
Workshops delivery: The workshop no. 1 attracted most interest and has been delivered to 7 groups of school kids. It has influenced delivery of similar activities forming part of an outreach programme of the Wojtek Memorial Trust, featuring story-telling session of a writer Jenny Roberts. Interest has also been voiced from two Edinburgh schools (primary and secondary) as well as externally funded project to utilize the workshop’s scope and materials in the future however no detailed arrangements have been made so far. Workshop no. 2 was delivered to 4 groups of kids. The Mapa Scotland charity team supported the sessions delivered during the Polish Scottish Heritage Festival. Workshop no. 3 has been developed as last one and has not been requested by any school. Materials developed for the workshop have been utilized at the Polish Scottish Heritage Festival and subsequently donated to the Scottish Polish Cultural Association. Schools involved in the workshops: Name
Polish Scottish or other 28 0
All
45
0
45
3 25
73 10
76 35
St Mary’s school Leith Links
70
50
120
Summary
171
133
304
Polska Szkoła Sobotnia pod patronatem Stowarzyszenia Polskich Kombatantów w Edynburgu The Frederic Chopin Polish Centre for Culture and Education in Edinburg Lochgelly South Primary Polish Scottish Heritage Festival drop in sessions
28
PROJECT PROMOTION Polish Scottish Heritage Project Media & Marketing Campaign Summary Polish Scottish Heritage project marketing campaign run throughout duration of the project. It has been specifically tailored for the different target groups and has been very successful. Publicity materials 3000 -Festival Programmes - distributed to all libraries in Edinburgh through our partnership with City of Edinburgh Council and also by volunteers to Polish shops in Edinburgh and Glasgow and by representatives of Polish and Scottish Organisations to their networks of contacts 5000 -Festival of History Programmes – including information about our events in November distributed all around Edinburgh and as an insert to the Skinny Magazine 1000 - Project Leaflets- distributed during our promotional and community engagement events. 2100 – Exhibition posters distributed during festival events as a giveaway.
Community engagement at events We took part in a few community initiatives and organised project promotional events: Polish Scottish Heritage Project/Multimedia Showcase 13-17 November 2013 at Meow Studios Leith Decides 15 February 2014 at Leith Community Centre Polish Scottish Heritage Celebrates 25 Years of Freedom / Toast for Freedom Event 4th June 2014 at Secret Arcade Pub Leith Gala Day at Leith Festival 14th June 2014 at Leith Links Park During these events we have been running a stalls, distributed leaflets and actively engaging with the community to promote the project and its aims.
Social Media We have been also promoting the project through by running social media campaign on Facebook and Twitter. Please see below our social media output for June.
Community engagement via community networks Our project was also widely promoted to the wide range of organisations and partners who helped us to promote the project: Cross Party Group on Poland at the Scottish Parliament (over 70 representatives of Polish Cultural Organisations, Businesses , local authorities and other organisations supporting Polish Community) Council of the Polish Organisations in Scotland RADA Scottish Polish Cultural Association Interactive Writing Salon in Scotland
Polish and Scottish Media We have developed partnerships with a broad range of media and run promotional campaigns locally and nationally. The information about the projects was published on their website, promoted through their social media and we also organised competitions to win tickets for the festival events. Our Scottish media partners were: Edinburgh.pl , emito.net, Open Scotland.pl, Emigrant Magazine Our National media partners were:
Londynek.net, Gazeta Polonijna.co.uk and Moja Wyspa.co.uk The Project was also promoted in Poland by a national newspaper dziennik.pl We have also promoted the project in the Polish Radio External Service and we have been featured in two BBC Radio Scotland programmes: The Culture Studio with Janice Forsyth and Good Morning Scotland with Gillian Sharpe. The article about the festival and the project was also featured in Scotsman. EWALUACION To provide evidence and insight as well as enable identification of future change for the project we have monitored and evaluated our activities. We have gathered project feedback using an on-line questionnaire (survey monkey). The questionnaire was sent out to mailing list created during the Festival as well as through our Social Media. The questionnaire was seen by 246 people, with response from 76 (30% response rate). Furthermore we have organised focus group for volunteers that took part in both; oral history project and Polish Scottish Heritage Festival project as well as the project team. We wanted to keep it simple and short to maximise response rate. That is why we only ask couple of questions; Describe one thing that you have learned through the project? Is there anything that we could do make it better? Are this type of projects needed, explain why? Do you have any other comments?. Comments gathered through the questionnaires allow us to evidence how we contributed to the objectives of the Historic Scotland and selected will be presented in the next section.
''Championing Scotland's historic environment'' "Always better to strengthen connection between people. It will also reduce hostility some people unfortunately feel for people from elsewhere" ‘’The Polish community in Scotland is quite big and lots of these people are going to live here permanently. Therefore, for both communities it is important to integrate and live together aware of their shared heritage. For Scots it is a fun way to get to know who are these Polish people who came to live here and learn about their nice side. For Poles, these events are helpful to feel more like a home, here in Scotland and being still connected with the homeland’’ ‘’Some people are already aware of the Polish-Scottish links but events like this Festival can spread the story to a new audience’’ ‘’ Need to continue to promote links in Scottish polish culture especially for all the new generation working Poles who need to feel welcome and continue to integrate. ‘’Also for Poles living in Scotland its a great chance to feel as part of the community with a culture to offer’’
1) Our outreach programme helped people of different ages, economic groups and ethnic backgrounds to understand enjoy and appreciate the value of the Polish Scottish Heritage. The project activities engaged people in dialogue about historical events that joined our nation and help them to understand how much we have in common. That resulted in building a sense of belonging and a sense of place for Polish migrants, as well as mutual understanding, key to successful integration, which is hugely important for Scotland's future. 2) The project engaged with number of public, private and voluntary sector organisation increasing the level of collaborations with a purpose of maximizing the benefit of the historic environment. Some of the organisations that we have worked with are; The project has awaken interest and number of people were contacting us to share their stories, donate archive materials or contribute, write web-site articles (half of the web-site article were written by volunteers). Furthermore, the Advisory Board members collaboration has resulted in successful application to Some comments from the evaluation that supports statements above are in the boxes
‘’There is a strong historical link between Poland and Scotland. Often individuals believe that the link is onesided, where Polish immigration takes place to Scotland (the UK). But we know that it is two-sided, where Scots immigrated to Poland in the 17th century. It is important to illustrate this two-sided link between the two nations’’
''Contributing to sustainable economic growth'' Our project brought in to focus 35 different sites/places of significance for our shared national history. Researched, discussed and presented at our web-site histories of places, events and people are linked to a
specific location into an easy to follow and understand “Heritage Trail�, in the format of an interactive map. We believe it will make it easier for people from Scotland and beyond to plan their sightseeing trips, resulting in an increased number of visitors to the sites included in the Trail.
One of the Festival’s aims was promote the web-site and highlight the stories and sites included in the Trail. We have had number of events that achieve that aim and increased public awareness about the sites. Below we present some of the comments from our survey monkey that evidence interest generated in new historical events via our project.
Please mark all statements that describe how you felt about the festival. Answer Options I enjoyed myself I learned something new I met some new people I felt proud of the shared heritage It made me think differently about the history Nothing was interesting to me
Response Count 54 45 38 39 25 0
I learned ….. ’The story of a Polish family who were forced to travel from Poland to Siberia to Kazakhstan during WWII, and eventually to Scotland’’, ‘’That Bonnie Prince Charlies mother was Polish (and Drambuie is of Polish origin-which it tells you on the back of the bottle!)’’ ‘’I've learnt about Kazimierz Piechowski and his brave heart, I met Katy Carr and was really impressed with her music. Also learnt about strong connections between our nations which have been developing since middle ages’’ ‘’I learned that Chopin was Polish from the story board timelines and that he visited Scotland’’ ‘’I learned that Robert Gordon was a merchant trading with Poland’’ ‘’The Stuart-Sobieswki (?) brothers book on tartans (didn't know that existed) and that the Scots were so prevalent in Poland that Poles used to threaten their kids with 'behave or the Scots will come and get you!’’
''Managing Scotland’s historic environment creatively'' The programme gathered historical information and provide interpretation using a variety of multimedia story telling techniques (e.g. photographs, videos, podcasts prepared in an Oral History sub-project). ''Increasing enjoyment of Scotland’s historic environment through the use of technology'. Project has created 10 short documentaries presenting different aspects, stories of shared Polish Scottish Heritage. All of the movies can be accessed via our web-site or you tube channel.
Through our oral history sub- project we have interviewed number of interesting people sharing their life stories and exploring their Polish Scottish connections. Interviews have been edited into 10 minutes podcasts accessible to all via our web-site or you tube channel.
With these in mind we believe that the Polish-Scottish Heritage Trail project contributed to the delivery of Historic Scotland's corporate objectives, benefiting the Scottish historic environment as well as creatively addressing the needs of the community.
Budget The Historic Scotland had granted us ÂŁ3000 to contribute towards the 20 000ÂŁ estimated budget for the festival. Below I attached outline of cost for some of our outreach activities. I attach invoices and receipts to the e-mail.
Budget Date 04/09/2014 24/06/2014 19-Jun-14 11/06/2014 06/07/2014 08/07/2014 16/05/2014 01/09/2014 24/06/2014 08/08/2014 26/06/2014 24/06/2014 03/07/2014 24/06/2014 16/06/2014 Total
Activity Documentaries BRIAN HUTCHISON TECH MANAGEMENT MEDIA CONTROL EURO E22525 ADCENTIVE 122231
illustrations design DAWID NABIALEK DESIGN PANELS BC PRINTING PSHT PROGRAMME PRI LIDIA KRZYNOWEK HLF SALARY APR MAY JOANNA ZAWADZKA HLF MARKETING & EX KP outreach co-ordinator SUMMERHALL INV2067 ALEKSANDER KUDAJCZ ARTIST FEE Katy Carr Professional Fees LOUISE RUTKOWSKI ARTIST FEE KATY CARR TRAVEL
Cost (£) 3000 300 144 1500 250 1019 670 1166 3250 4800 2400 500 544 350 182.5 20075.5
Heading Learning Materials Equipment and materials Equipment and materials Learning Materials Learning Materials Marketing and promotion Marketing and promotion Professional Fees Professional Fees Professional Fees Room Hire Speakers Fee Speakers Fee Speakers Fee Travel Staff